Theodore Roosevelt: Trending quotes

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“Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.”

Theodore Roosevelt

Ch. IX : Outdoors and Indoors, p. 336; the final statement "quoted by Squire Bill Widener" as well as variants of it, are often misattributed to Roosevelt himself.
Variant: Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.
Attributed to Roosevelt in Conquering an Enemy Called Average (1996) by John L. Mason, Nugget # 8 : The Only Place to Start is Where You Are. <!-- The Military Quotation Book, Revised and Expanded: More than 1,200 of the Best Quotations About War, Leadership, Courage, Victory, and Defeat (2002) by James Charlton -->
Variant: Do what you can, with what you've got, where you are.
Context: There are many kinds of success in life worth having. It is exceedingly interesting and attractive to be a successful business man, or railroad man, or farmer, or a successful lawyer or doctor; or a writer, or a President, or a ranchman, or the colonel of a fighting regiment, or to kill grizzly bears and lions. But for unflagging interest and enjoyment, a household of children, if things go reasonably well, certainly makes all other forms of success and achievement lose their importance by comparison. It may be true that he travels farthest who travels alone; but the goal thus reached is not worth reaching. And as for a life deliberately devoted to pleasure as an end — why, the greatest happiness is the happiness that comes as a by-product of striving to do what must be done, even though sorrow is met in the doing. There is a bit of homely philosophy, quoted by Squire Bill Widener, of Widener's Valley, Virginia, which sums up one's duty in life: "Do what you can, with what you've got, where you are."

Deep , Inspirational , Courageous , Success

“Any given case must be treated on its special merits.”

Theodore Roosevelt

1910s, The Progressives, Past and Present (1910)
Context: Any given case must be treated on its special merits. Each community should be required to deal with all that is of merely local interest; and nothing should be undertaken by the Government of the whole country which can thus wisely be left to local management. But those functions of government which no wisdom on the part of the States will enable them satisfactorily to perform must be performed by the National Government. We are all Americans; our common interests are as broad as the continent; the most vital problems are those that affect us all alike. The regulation of big business, and therefore the control of big property in the public interest, are preeminently instances of such functions which can only be performed efficiently and wisely by the Nation; and, moreover, so far as labor is employed in connection with inter-State business, it should also be treated as a matter for the National Government. The National power over inter-State commerce warrants our dealing with such questions as employers’ liability in inter-State business, and the protection and compensation for injuries of railway employees. The National Government of right has, and must exercise its power for the protection of labor which is connected with the instrumentalities of inter-State commerce.

“If you could kick the person in the pants responsible for most of your trouble, you wouldn't sit for a month.”

Theodore Roosevelt
Personality , Funny

“The most vicious cowboy has more moral principle than the average Indian.”

Theodore Roosevelt

January 1886, in a campaign speech given in New York https://www.history.com/news/teddy-roosevelt-race-imperialism-national-parks
1880s

“I don’t go so far as to think that the only good Indian is the dead Indian, but I believe nine out of every ten are, and I shouldn’t like to inquire too closely into the case of the tenth.”

Theodore Roosevelt

1880s
Source: Ibid, January 1886 https://www.history.com/news/teddy-roosevelt-race-imperialism-national-parks

Dead , Thinking

“There were all kinds of things I was afraid of at first, ranging from grizzly bears to 'mean' horses and gun-fighters; but by acting as if I was not afraid I gradually ceased to be afraid.”

Theodore Roosevelt

Chapter II The Vigor of Life http://www.bartleby.com/55/2.html
1910s, Theodore Roosevelt — An Autobiography (1913)

Horse

“We must ever judge each individual on his own conduct and merits, and not on his membership in any class, whether that class be based on theological, social, or industrial considerations.”

Theodore Roosevelt

Source: 1910s, Theodore Roosevelt — An Autobiography (1913), Ch. VI : The New York Police

“No candid observer will deny that whatever of good there may be in our American civilization is the product of Christianity.”

Theodore Roosevelt

“Our Nation, A Product of Christianity,” Springfield Republican, 1884, editorial.
1880s

“We need, in the interest of the community at large, a rigid system of game laws rigidly enforced, and it is not only admissible, but one may almost say necessary, to establish, under the control of the State, great national forest reserves, which shall also be breeding grounds and nurseries for wild game; but I should much regret to see grow up in this country a system of large private game preserves, kept for the enjoyment of the very rich.”

Theodore Roosevelt

The Wilderness Hunter, p. 270 (1893)
1890s

Game , Country , Law , Communication

“It is a dreadful thing to come into the Presidency in this way; but it would be far worse to be morbid about it. Here is the task, and I have got to do it to the best of my ability.”

Theodore Roosevelt

Probably 1901. Theodore Roosevelt Inaugural National Historical Site -- National Park Service https://www.nps.gov/thri/learn/historyculture/index.htm
1900s

Way

“To waste, to destroy, our natural resources, to skin and exhaust the land instead of using it so as to increase its usefulness, will result in undermining in the days of our children the very prosperity which we ought by right to hand down to them amplified and developed.”

Theodore Roosevelt

Seventh State of the Union (3 December 1907)
1900s

Children , Nature

“No hard and fast rule can be laid down as to where our legislation shall stop in interfering between man and man, between interest and interest. All that can be said is that it is highly undesirable on the one hand, to weaken individual initiative, and on the other hand, that in a constantly increasing number of cases we shall find it necessary in the future to shackle cunning as in the past we have shackled force.”

Theodore Roosevelt

1900s, Speak softly and carry a big stick (1901)

Past , Future

“Exactly as each man, while doing first his duty to his wife and the children within his home, must yet, if he hopes to amount to much, strive mightily in the world outside his home, so our nation, while first of all seeing to its own domestic well-being, must not shrink from playing its part among the great nations without. Our duty may take many forms in the future as it has taken many forms in the past. Nor is it possible to lay down a hard-and-fast rule for all cases. We must ever face the fact of our shifting national needs, of the always-changing opportunities that present themselves. But we may be certain of one thing: whether we wish it or not, we cannot avoid hereafter having duties to do in the face of other nations. All that we can do is to settle whether we shall perform these duties well or ill.”

Theodore Roosevelt

1900s, The Strenuous Life: Essays and Addresses (1900), National Duties

Home , Past , Future , Children

“Americanism means the virtues of courage, honor, justice, truth, sincerity, and hardihood—the virtues that made America. The things that will destroy America are prosperity-at-any-price, peace-at-any-price, safety-first instead of duty-first, the love of soft living and the get-rich-quick theory of life.”

Theodore Roosevelt

Letter to S. Stanwood Menken, chairman, committee on Congress of Constructive Patriotism (January 10, 1917). Roosevelt’s sister, Mrs. Douglas Robinson, read the letter to a national meeting, January 26, 1917. Reported in Proceedings of the Congress of Constructive Patriotism, Washington, D.C., January 25–27, 1917 (1917), p. 172
1910s

Courage , Peace , Justice , Truth

“We grudge no man a fortune which represents merely his own power and sagacity exercised with entire regard to the welfare of his fellows. But the fortune must not only be honorably obtained and well used; it is also essential that it should not represent a necessary incident of widespread, even though partial, economic privation. It is not even enough that the fortune should have been gained without doing damage to the community. We should only permit it to be gained and kept so long as the gaining and the keeping represent benefit to the community.”

Theodore Roosevelt

1910s, The Progressives, Past and Present (1910)

Communication , Exercises

“We must recognize that it is a cardinal sin against democracy to support a man for public office because he belongs to a given creed or to oppose him because he belongs to a given creed. It is just as evil as to draw the line between class and class, between occupation and occupation in political life. No man who tries to draw either line is a good American. True Americanism demands that we judge each man on his conduct, that we so judge him in private life and that we so judge him in public life.”

Theodore Roosevelt

1910s, Address to the Knights of Columbus (1915)

Democracy , Drawing , Support , Life