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Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency

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Title: Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency


1
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • 1901 President McKinley assassinated
  • I told William McKinley that it was a mistake to
    nominate that wild man at Philadelphia, I asked
    him if he realized what would happen if he should
    die. Now look, that damned cowboy is President
    of the United States! Mark Hanna

2
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • Roosevelt became the youngest president (42) but
    he never openly rebelled against the leaders of
    his party, instead he became a champion of
    cautious, moderate change

3
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • Believed that the government should be a mediator
    of the public good, with the president at its
    center, he also believed that economic
    concentration had resulted in a consolidation of
    power that produced dangerous abuses of power,
    urged regulation (but not destruction) of the
    trusts

4
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • Roosevelt wanted the government to have the power
    to investigate the activities of the corporations
    and publicize the results, believing that
    educated public opinion would eliminate most of
    the corporate abuses

5
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • Department of Commerce and Labor (1903) - along
    with the Bureau of Corporations was to
    investigate activities of corporations and
    publicize them

6
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • In 1902 Roosevelt ordered the Justice Department
    to invoke the Sherman Anti-Trust Act against the
    Northern Securities Company, which was a 400
    million railroad monopoly in the Northwest led by
    JP Morgan, EH Harriman, and James J. Hill.

7
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • If we have done anything wrong, send your man to
    my man and they can fix it up, Roosevelt
    proceeded with the case and in 1904 the Supreme
    Court case ruled that the company must be
    dissolved

8
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • Even though Roosevelt filed more than 40
    additional antitrust suits during his presidency,
    he had no serious commitment to reverse the
    prevailing trend toward economic concentration

9
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • In 1902 the United Mine Workers went on strike
    against the anthracite coal industry, it dragged
    on long enough to endanger coal supplies,
    Roosevelt asked both operators and miners to
    accept impartial

10
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • Federal arbitration, the mine operators resisted
    and Roosevelt threatened to seize the mines, in
    arbitration the miners got a 10 wage increase
    and a 9 hour work day, more then the union
    wouldve got without Roosevelts help, but
    Roosevelt also on several occasions sent in
    federal troops on the behalf of the employers,
    Roosevelts Square Deal

11
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • During Roosevelts first term he was principally
    concerned with winning re-election, so could not
    afford to antagonize the conservative Republican
    Old Guard, he dispensed patronage to
    conservatives and progressives equally, he won
    the support of northern businessmen and reformers
    alike.

12
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • In the election of 1904 Roosevelt faced
    conservative Democrat Alton B. Parker and won 57
    of the popular vote and lost no state outside of
    the South, was free to display the extent of his
    commitment to reform in his second term

13
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • The Interstate Commerce Act of 1887 established
    the Interstate Commerce Commission, which was an
    early effort to regulate the railroad industry
    but it was weakened by the courts, Roosevelt got
    the Hepburn.

14
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • Railroad Regulation Act of 1905 passed which
    sought to restore some regulatory authority over
    railroad rates to the government, many were
    enraged at how cautious it was (Senator
    LaFollette)

15
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • The Pure Food and Drug Act restricted the sale of
    dangerous or ineffective medicines, but was
    limited by its weak enforcement mechanisms

16
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • In 1906 Upton Sinclair wrote the powerful novel
    The Jungle, which caused Roosevelt to push for
    the Meat Inspection Act that ultimately helped
    eliminate many diseases once transported in
    impure meat

17
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • Starting in 1907 Roosevelt began pushing for more
    stringent reforms such as an 8-hour work day,
    compensation for victims of industrial accidents,
    an inheritance and income tax, and regulation of
    the stock market.

18
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • Roosevelt also began to openly criticize
    conservatives in Congress and the judiciary who
    were obstructing these programs, this resulted in
    a widening gap between the president and
    conservative wing of his party

19
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • Roosevelt was concerned about the unregulated
    exploitation of Americas natural resources and
    its remaining wilderness, using his executive
    powers Roosevelt restricted private development
    on millions of acres of undeveloped land, mostly
    in the West, by adding them to the National
    Forest system

20
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • Conservatives in Congress passed a law in 1907
    restricting Roosevelts authority over public
    land, Roosevelt and Gifford Pinchot (chief
    forester) worked to seize all the forests and
    many of the waterpower sites that were still in
    the public domain before the bill became law

21
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • Conservationists promoted policies to protect
    land for carefully managed development, the
    National Forest Service (led by Pinchot)
    supported rational and efficient human use of the
    wilderness

22
Establishment of National Parks and Forests
23
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • Roosevelt's legacy in conservation was that he
    established the government role as a manager of
    the continuing development of the wilderness

24
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • The National Reclamation Act (Newlands Act)
    provided federal funds for the construction of
    dams, reservoirs and canals in the West -
    projects that would open new lands for
    cultivation and provide cheap electric power this
    was the beginning of many years of critical
    federal aid for irrigation and power development
    in the West

25
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • George Perkins wrote Man and Nature in which he
    said the most important consequence of losing
    forests was the forests role in stabilizing the
    natural environment, received wide attention and
    became the basis for the National Forest Service

26
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • Roosevelt championed the expansion of the
    National Forest System as a way to protect the
    landscape for continued rational lumbering, but
    he also greatly expanded the National Park System
    to protect public land from any exploitation or
    development at all

27
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • First national park was Yellowstone in Wyoming
    (1872), followed by Yosemite and Sequoia in
    California and Mount Rainer in Washington
    (1890s), Roosevelt added Crater Lake (OR), Mesa
    Verde (UT), Platt (OK), Wind Cave (SD)

28
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • Hetch Hetchy Valley in Yosemite was a spectacular
    high walled valley highly popular with
    conservationists, but San Francisco residents
    wanted to dam it in order to create reservoir for
    the city, after the San Francisco earthquake of
    1906 and the resulting fire, the public outcry
    for the dam increased.

29
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • Opposed by Muir and the Sierra Club, the case was
    turned over to Pinchot who approved construction
    of the dam, Pinchot who believed in the rational
    use of nature was not swayed by Muirs aesthetic
    and spiritual arguments

30
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • Muir helped place a referendum on the issue on
    the ballot in 1908, but dam was approved by huge
    margins, the construction of the dam would
    finally begin after WWI, the fight against the
    Hetch Hetchy dam helped mobilize a new coalition
    of people committed to preservation, not the
    "rational use" of wilderness

31
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • Panic of 1907 American industrial production
    outran the ability of either domestic or foreign
    markets to absorb it, the banking system and the
    stock market displayed pathetic inadequacies, and
    irresponsible speculation and rampant financial
    mismanagement shattered the prosperity that many
    thought was permanent

32
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • The conservatives blamed Roosevelt's "mad"
    economic policies, he disagreed but did not
    interfere with their recovery efforts, JP Morgan
    helped create a pool of assets from several
    important New York banks to prop up shaky
    financial institutions.

33
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • The key to this arrangement was the purchase of
    the shares of Tennessee Coal and Iron Company
    which were held by a threatened New York bank, US
    Steel would buy the shares but needed assurances
    from Roosevelt that he would not face antitrust
    action, Roosevelt agreed and the Panic soon
    subsided

34
Theodore Roosevelt and The Modern Presidency
  • Roosevelt made a promise in 1904 that he would
    not seek a third term, so after 8 years in the
    White House in which he had transformed the role
    of the presidency in American government,
    Roosevelt retired from public life at the age of
    50

35
The Troubled Succession
  • William Howard Taft was Roosevelt's handpicked
    successor, seemed acceptable to both progressives
    and conservatives, easily defeated William
    Jennings Bryan in the 1908 election, however, 4
    years later Taft left office as the most
    decisively defeated president of the 20th
    Century, his party deeply divided, and with the
    Democrats in control of the government for the
    first time in 20 years

36
The Troubled Succession
  • Taft called Congress into special session to
    lower protective tariff rates, but Taft made no
    attempt to overcome the opposition of Old Guard
    Republicans arguing that it would violate
    doctrine of separation of powers, the result was
    the Payne-Aldrich Tariff which reduced tariff
    rates scarcely at all, and in some areas raised
    them, progressives resented Tafts passivity

37
The Troubled Succession
  • Taft replaced Roosevelt's secretary of interior,
    James R. Garfield an ardent conservationist, with
    a the conservative Richard A. Ballinger, a
    conservative corporate lawyer, Ballinger
    attempted to invalidate Roosevelt's removal of 1
    million acres of forests and mineral reserves
    from the public lands available for private
    development

38
The Troubled Succession
  • Louis Glavis, an Interior Department
    investigator, charged Ballinger with having
    connived to turn over valuable public coal lands
    in Alaska to a private syndicate for personal
    profit, Glavis took the evidence to Pinchot and
    Pinchot took the investigation to Taft.

39
The Troubled Succession
  • Taft investigated the claims, found that they
    were groundless and fired Glavis, Pinchot leaked
    the story out into the press and Taft fired
    Pinchot for insubordination.

40
The Troubled Succession
  • The result of the Ballinger-Pinchot dispute
    aroused public passion and Taft alienated
    supporters of Roosevelt completely
  • Roosevelt became furious with Taft when he
    returned to New York in 1910 and felt that he
    alone was capable of reuniting the Republican
    Party

(Taft has) completely twisted around the
policies I advocated and acted upon.
Theodore Roosevelt
41
The Troubled Succession
  • Roosevelt's New Nationalism made it clear he
    had moved away from the cautious conservatism of
    the first years of his presidency, argued that
    social justice was possible only through vigorous
    efforts of strong federal government whose
    executive acted as the steward of the public
    welfare, those who thought primarily of property
    rights and personal profit must now give way to
    the advocate of human welfare

42
The Troubled Succession
  • Roosevelt supported graduated income and
    inheritance taxes, workers' compensation for
    industrial accidents, regulation of the labor of
    women and children, tariff revision, firmer
    regulation of corporations

43
The Troubled Succession
  • In the Congressional elections of 1910,
    conservative Republicans went down to defeat
    while progressive Republican incumbents were
    reelected, Democrats ran progressive candidates
    of their own and gained control of the House of
    Representatives for the first time in 16 years,
    reform sentiment was on the rise

44
The Troubled Succession
  • In 1911 the Taft administration announced a suit
    that charged US Steel with antitrust violations
    in the 1907 acquisition of the Tennessee Coal and
    Iron Company, Roosevelt was enraged by the
    implication that he had acted improperly

45
The Troubled Succession
  • In 1912 Senator La Follette, who had been
    campaigning for president himself, suffered a
    nervous breakdown (exhausted and distraught over
    his daughters illness) Roosevelt announced his
    candidacy for president on February 22, 1912

46
The Troubled Succession
  • The campaign for the Republican nomination was
    battle between Roosevelt (progressives) and Taft
    (conservatives) but Taft remained the choice of
    most party leaders who controlled the nominating
    process, Roosevelt told the convention We stand
    at Armageddon and we battle for the Lord, the
    Republican convention nominated Taft

47
The Troubled Succession
  • Roosevelt launched the new Progressive Party and
    nominated himself as the presidential candidate,
    Roosevelt approached the campaign "fit as a bull
    moose", but many of the insurgents who had
    supported him during the primaries refused to
    follow him out of the Republican party

48
Woodrow Wilson and the New Freedom
  • Democrats nominated the only true progressive
    candidate, Woodrow Wilson, on the 46th ballot at
    the convention in Baltimore in 1912
  • President of Princeton University 1902 1910,
    Governor of New Jersey 1910 1912, displayed a
    commitment to reform

49
Woodrow Wilson and the New Freedom
  • Wilson's New Freedom believed bigness (economic
    concentration in the trusts) was both unjust and
    inefficient, proper response to monopoly was not
    to regulate it but to destroy it

50
Woodrow Wilson and the New Freedom
  • 1912 Election Roosevelt and Taft split the
    Republican vote allowing Wilson to win the
    election

51
Woodrow Wilson and the New Freedom
  • Wilson concentrated the powers of the executive
    branch in his own hands, he exerted firm control
    over his cabinet, and delegated real authority to
    those whose loyalty to him was beyond question,
    Colonel Edward M. House was Wilsons most
    powerful advisor even though he held no official
    position in the executive branch

52
Woodrow Wilson and the New Freedom
  • The Democrats captured both houses of Congress in
    the 1912 election, which made it much easier for
    Wilson to get his progressive agenda passed

53
Woodrow Wilson and the New Freedom
  • Wilson called Congress into special session in
    order to pass the Underwood- Simmons Tariff,
    which substantially lowered the protective tariff
    in order to allow real competition into American
    markets and break the power of the trusts.

54
Woodrow Wilson and the New Freedom
  • Congress approved a graduated income tax (under
    the 16th Amendment) to make up for lost revenue
    from the tariff, this first modern income tax
    imposed a 1 tax on individuals and corporations
    earning over 4,000 up to a maximum of 6 on
    incomes of over 500,000

55
Woodrow Wilson and the New Freedom
  • The Federal Reserve Act (1913) created twelve
    regional banks, each to be owned and controlled
    by the individual banks of its district, these
    regional banks would hold a certain percentage of
    the assets of their member banks in reserve.

56
Woodrow Wilson and the New Freedom
  • The system would use those reserves to support
    loans to private banks at an interest rate that
    the Federal Reserve Board would set, they would
    also issue a new type of currency, Federal
    Reserve Notes, which would become the nations
    basic medium of trade and backed by the
    government.

57
Woodrow Wilson and the New Freedom
  • The Federal Reserve System would be able to shift
    funds quickly to troubled areas, to meet
    increased demand for credit, or to protect
    imperiled banks.

58
Woodrow Wilson and the New Freedom
  • The Federal Trade Commission created a regulatory
    agency that would help businesses determine in
    advance whether their actions would be acceptable
    to the government, the agency would also have
    authority to launch prosecutions against "unfair
    trade practices", it would also have the power to
    investigate corporate behavior

59
Woodrow Wilson and the New Freedom
  • The Clayton Antitrust Act was attacked by
    conservative interests and weakened it greatly
  • Wilson did little to protect it

60
Woodrow Wilson and the New Freedom
  • By the fall of 1914, Wilson believed that
    agitation for reform would slowly subside, he
    refused to support movement for women's suffrage,
    condoned the reimposition of segregation in the
    agencies of the federal government (southern
    Democrats), he dismissed progressive proposals
    for additional reform legislation as
    unconstitutional or unnecessary

61
Woodrow Wilson and the New Freedom
  • The 1914 congressional elections resulted in the
    Democrats suffering major losses in Congress led
    by voters who had supported the Progressive Party
    returning to the Republican Party

62
Woodrow Wilson and the New Freedom
  • In January 1916, Wilson appointed Louis Brandeis
    to the Supreme Court becoming the first Jewish
    member of the Court and also the most progressive
    member of the Court

63
Woodrow Wilson and the New Freedom
  • Wilson sponsored measures that expanded the role
    of the national government, he supported the
    Keating-Owen Act (1916) which was the first
    federal law regulating child labor, it prohibited
    the shipment of goods produced by underage
    children across state lines, the Supreme Court
    struck down the Keating-Owen Act in 1918

64
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • The President could act in foreign policy with
    less regard for Congress and the Supreme Court
    overseas the president could exercise power
    unfettered and alone

65
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • Roosevelt pursued an activist foreign policy,
    believed in the value of using American power in
    the world "speak softly but carry a big stick",
  • He believed in an important distinction between
    the "civilized" and "uncivilized" nations of the
    world

66
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • Civilized nations were predominantly white,
    Anglo-Saxon, producers of industrial goods, had a
    right and duty to intervene in the affairs of the
    backward nation to preserve order and stability.
  • Uncivilized nations were non-white, Latin or
    Slavic, suppliers of raw materials and markets,
    not yet industrialized

67
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • By 1906, the American navy was surpassed only by
    that of Britain, although Germany was rapidly
    gaining ground

68
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • Japan staged a surprise attack on the Russian
    fleet at Port Arthur in southern Manchuria
    (China), Roosevelt agreed to mediate an end to
    the conflict, at the peace conference in
    Portsmouth, New Hampshire Roosevelt extracted
    from the Russians a recognition of Japan's
    territorial gains, and from Japan an agreement to
    cease fighting and expansion

69
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • He also negotiated a secret agreement with the
    Japanese to ensure that the US could continue to
    trade freely in the region, Roosevelt won the
    Nobel Peace Prize in 1906 for his work in ending
    the Russo-Japanese War

70
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • Japan destroyed the Russian fleet at Port Arthur
    and began to emerge as the preeminent naval power
    in the Pacific, the Japanese began to exclude
    American trade from many of the territories that
    it controlled.

71
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • Roosevelt sent the Great White Fleet (sixteen
    American battleships) on a trip around the world
    to remind Japan of the potential might of the US
    Naval forces

72
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • In 1902, the naval forces of Britain, Italy and
    Germany blockaded Venezuela's coast in response
    to Venezuela's reneging on debts owed to European
    countries, German ships began to bombard a
    Venezuelan port amid rumors that Germany planned
    to establish a permanent base in the region,
    Roosevelt used the threat of American naval power
    to pressure German navy to withdraw

73
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • Roosevelt Corollary (1904) to the Monroe
    doctrine, the US had the right not only to oppose
    European intervention in the Western Hemisphere,
    but to intervene itself in the domestic affairs
    of its neighbors if they proved unable to
    maintain order and national sovereignty on their
    own

74
The United States and Latin America, 1895-1941
75
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • In 1903 the Dominican Republic went bankrupt, it
    owed 22 million to European nations, Roosevelt
    gained control of Dominican customs and
    distributed 45 of the revenues to Dominicans and
    the rest to foreign creditors

76
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • The Platt Amendment gave the US the right to
    prevent any foreign power from intruding into
    Cuba, in 1906 American troops landed to keep the
    peace and remained there for 3 years

77
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • The Panama Canal was the most celebrated
    accomplishment of Roosevelt's presidency it
    linked the Pacific and the Atlantic by creating a
    channel through Central America

78
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • Roosevelt sent John Hay, his Secretary of State,
    to negotiate an agreement with Colombian
    diplomats, Tomas Herren signed an agreement
    giving US perpetual rights to six-mile wide
    "canal zone" across Colombia in return for 10
    million and an annual rent of 250,000

79
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • The Colombian Senate was outraged and did not
    ratify the Herren agreement, sent a new
    representative to Washington demanding 20
    million and share of the payment to the French

80
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • Phillippe Bunau-Varilla was the chief engineer of
    the French canal project, he helped organize and
    finance a revolution in Panama, Roosevelt landed
    troops from the U.S.S Nashville to maintain
    order and their presence prevented Colombian
    forced from suppressing the rebellion.

81
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • The new Panamanian government was recognized by
    Roosevelt 3 days later and quickly agreed to the
    canal project, it opened in 1914

82
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • Dollar Diplomacy Taft's Secretary of State
    Philander C. Knox worked aggressively to extend
    American investments into less-developed regions,
    Americans intervene in Nicaragua (1909) and then
    made substantial loans to the new government thus
    increasing the US financial leverage over the
    country, two years later a revolution broke out
    again and US troops remained in Nicaragua for
    over a decade

83
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • 1916 Americans established a military government
    in Dominican Republic after Dominicans refused to
    accept a treaty that would have made the country
    a virtual American protectorate Wilson bought the
    Danish West Indies from the Dutch (fearful that
    the Germans were about to acquire them) and
    renamed them the Virgin Islands

84
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • Under Porfirio Diaz, the corrupt dictator of
    Mexico, American businesses had been establishing
    an enormous economic presence in Mexico, in 1910,
    Diaz was overthrown by Francisco Madero who
    promised democratic reform and seemed hostile to
    American businesses in Mexico.

85
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • The US encouraged Victoriano Huerta to depose
    Madero and the Taft administration was ready to
    recognize the new Huerta regime and welcome back
    a receptive environment for American investments
    in Mexico.

86
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • The new government murdered Madero and Wilson
    announced he would never recognize Huerta's
    government of butchers, in 1913, Huerta, with the
    help of American business interests, established
    a full military dictatorship in Mexico

87
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • In April 1914, an officer in Huertas army
    temporarily arrested several American sailors
    from the U.S.S Dolphin who had gone ashore in
    Tampico, the men were immediately released but
    the American admiral was not satisfied with the
    apology he received demanded that the Huerta
    forces fire a 21 gun salute to the American flag
    as display of public penance, the Mexicans refused

88
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • Wilson used the incident as a pretext for seizing
    the Mexican port of Veracruz, in a clash with
    Mexican forces Americans killed 126 of the
    defenders and suffered 19 casualties of their own

89
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • The Carranza faction captured Mexico City, but
    refused to accept American guidelines for the
    creation of a new government, Wilson considered
    throwing American support to Pancho Villa but his
    military position deteriorated and Wilson
    abandoned him.

90
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • Pancho Villa retaliated by taking 16 American
    mining engineers off a train in northern Mexico
    and shooting them, 3 months later Pancho Villa
    led his soldiers across the border into Columbus,
    New Mexico where he killed 17 more Americans

91
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • Wilson ordered General John J. Pershing to lead
    an American expeditionary force across the
    Mexican border in pursuit of Pancho Villa, they
    never captured him but did get into conflicts
    with the Mexican army in which 40 Mexicans were
    killed and 12 Americans were killed.

92
The "Big Stick" America and the World, 1901-1917
  • The US and Mexico looked ready to go to war, but
    Wilson withdraw quietly and granted formal
    recognition to the Carranza regime.
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