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Theodore Roosevelt Quotes
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Theodore Roosevelt Jr. was an American statesman, author, explorer, soldier, and naturalist, who served as the 26th President of the United States from 1901 to 1909. He also served as the 25th Vice President of the United States from March to September 1901 and as the 33rd Governor of New York from 1899 to 1900. As a leader of the Republican Party during this time, he became a driving force for the Progressive Era in the United States in the early 20th century. His face is depicted on Mount Rushmore, alongside those of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Abraham Lincoln.

Roosevelt was born a sickly child with debilitating asthma, but he successfully overcame his physical health problems by embracing a strenuous lifestyle. He integrated his exuberant personality, vast range of interests, and world-famous achievements into a "cowboy" persona defined by robust masculinity. Home-schooled, he began a lifelong naturalist avocation before attending Harvard College. His book, The Naval War of 1812 , established his reputation as both a learned historian and as a popular writer. Upon entering politics, he became the leader of the reform faction of Republicans in New York's state legislature. Following the near-simultaneous deaths of his wife and mother, he escaped to a cattle ranch in the Dakotas. Roosevelt served as Assistant Secretary of the Navy under President William McKinley, but resigned from that post to lead the Rough Riders during the Spanish–American War. Returning a war hero, he was elected Governor of New York in 1898. After the death of Vice President Garret Hobart, the New York state party leadership convinced McKinley to accept Roosevelt as his running mate in the 1900 election, moving Roosevelt to the prestigious but powerless role of vice president. Roosevelt campaigned vigorously and the McKinley-Roosevelt ticket won a landslide victory based on a platform of peace, prosperity, and conservatism.

Following McKinley's assassination in September 1901, Roosevelt became president at age 42, and remains the youngest president. As a leader of the Progressive movement, he championed his "Square Deal" domestic policies, promising the average citizen fairness, breaking of trusts, regulation of railroads, and pure food and drugs. Making conservation a top priority, he established many new national parks, forests, and monuments intended to preserve the nation's natural resources. In foreign policy, he focused on Central America, where he began construction of the Panama Canal. He expanded the Navy and sent the Great White Fleet on a world tour to project the United States' naval power around the globe. His successful efforts to broker the end of the Russo-Japanese War won him the 1906 Nobel Peace Prize. He avoided the controversial tariff and money issues. Elected in 1904 to a full term, Roosevelt continued to promote progressive policies, but many of his efforts and much of his legislative agenda were eventually blocked in Congress. Roosevelt successfully groomed his close friend, William Howard Taft, and Taft won the 1908 presidential election to succeed him. In polls of historians and political scientists, Roosevelt is generally ranked as one of the five best presidents.

Frustrated with Taft's conservatism, Roosevelt belatedly tried to win the 1912 Republican nomination. He failed, walked out, and founded a third party, the Progressive, so-called "Bull Moose" Party, which called for wide-ranging progressive reforms. The split allowed the Democrats to win the White House. Following his election defeat, Roosevelt led a two-year expedition to the Amazon basin, where he nearly died of tropical disease. During World War I, he criticized President Woodrow Wilson for keeping the country out of the war with Germany, and his offer to lead volunteers to France was rejected. Though he had considered running for president again in 1920, Roosevelt's health continued to deteriorate, and he died in 1919.

✵ 27. October 1858 – 6. January 1919   •   Other names Teddy Rosevelt, Teddy Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt photo
Theodore Roosevelt: 445   quotes 506   likes

Theodore Roosevelt Quotes

“Women should have free access to every field of labor which they care to enter, and when their work is as valuable as that of a man it should be paid as highly.”

Theodore Roosevelt

Chapter V Applied Idealism http://www.bartleby.com/55/5.html
1910s, Theodore Roosevelt — An Autobiography (1913)

Women

“No man is above the law and no man is below it; nor do we ask any man's permission when we require him to obey it. Obedience to the law is demanded as a right; not asked as a favor.”

Theodore Roosevelt

Third State of the Union Address (7 December 1903)
1900s

Law

“The nation behaves well if it treats the natural resources as assets which it must turn over to the next generation increased, and not impaired, in value.”

Theodore Roosevelt

Speech before the Colorado Live Stock Association, Denver, Colorado (August 29, 1910); in The New Nationalism (1910), p. 52; also inscribed on Cox Corridor II, a first floor House corridor, U.S. Capitol.
1910s

Nature

“All the resources we need are in the mind.”

Theodore Roosevelt

“Patriotism means to stand by the country. It does not mean to stand by the president or any other public official.”

Theodore Roosevelt
Country

“I care not what others think of what I do, but I care very much about what I think of what I do! That is character!”

Theodore Roosevelt
Thinking

“People ask the difference between a leader and a boss… The leader works in the open, and the boss in covert. The leader leads, and the boss drives.”

Theodore Roosevelt
People

“There is quite enough sorrow and shame and suffering and baseness in real life, and there is no need for meeting it unnecessarily in fiction.”

Theodore Roosevelt
Life , Suffering

“Although not a very old man, I have yet lived a great deal in my life, and I have known sorrow too bitter and joy too keen to allow me to become either cast down or elated for more than a very brief period over any success or defeat.”

Theodore Roosevelt
Life , Success , Joy

“It is true of the Nation, as of the individual, that the greatest doer must also be a great dreamer.”

Theodore Roosevelt

Berkeley, CA http://www.trsite.org/content/pages/speaking-loudly (1911)
1910s

“We should not forget that it will be just as important to our descendants to be prosperous in their time as it is to us to be prosperous in our time.”

Theodore Roosevelt
Time , Forgetting

“The lack of power to take joy in outdoor nature is as real a misfortune as the lack of power to take joy in books”

Theodore Roosevelt
Books , Nature , Joy

“The government is us; we are the government, you and I.”

Theodore Roosevelt

Speech http://books.google.com/books?id=kfYEAAAAYAAJ&q=%22The+government+is+us+we+are+the+government+you+and+I%22&pg=PA521#v=onepage at Asheville, North Carolina (9 September 1902)
1900s

“This country will not be a permanently good place for any of us to live in unless we make it a reasonably good place for all of us to live in.”

Theodore Roosevelt

Chicago, IL http://www.trsite.org/content/pages/speaking-loudly (17 June 1912)
1910s

Country

“the most important single ingredient in the formula of success is knowing how to get along with people.”

Theodore Roosevelt
For Team , People , Success

“It behooves every man to remember that the work of the critic is of altogether secondary importance, and that in the end, progress is accomplished by the man who does things.”

Theodore Roosevelt

“A thorough knowledge of the Bible is worth more than a college education.”

Theodore Roosevelt

As quoted in Stepping Stones : The Complete Bible Narratives (1941)
Disputed

Education , Knowledge

“Americanism is a question of principle, of idealism, of character. It is not a matter of birthplace, or creed, or line of descent.”

Theodore Roosevelt

1910s, Address to the Knights of Columbus (1915)
Context: I appeal to history. Among the generals of Washington in the Revolutionary War were Greene, Putnam, and Lee, who were of English descent; Wayne and Sullivan, who were of Irish descent; Marion, who was of French descent; Schuyler, who was of Dutch descent, and Muhlenberg and Herkimer, who were of German descent. But they were all of them Americans and nothing else, just as much as Washington. Carroll of Carrollton was a Catholic; Hancock a Protestant; Jefferson was heterodox from the standpoint of any orthodox creed; but these and all the other signers of the Declaration of Independence stood on an equality of duty and right and liberty, as Americans and nothing else.
Context: The line of cleavage drawn on principle and conduct in public affairs is never in any healthy community identical with the line of cleavage between creed and creed or between class and class. On the contrary, where the community life is healthy, these lines of cleavage almost always run nearly at right angles to one another. It is eminently necessary to all of us that we should have able and honest public officials in the nation, in the city, in the state. If we make a serious and resolute effort to get such officials of the right kind, men who shall not only be honest but shall be able and shall take the right view of public questions, we will find as a matter of fact that the men we thus choose will be drawn from the professors of every creed and from among men who do not adhere to any creed.

Question

“I have a perfect horror of words that are not backed up by deeds.”

Theodore Roosevelt

Oyster Bay, NY http://www.trsite.org/content/pages/speaking-loudly (7 July 1915)
1910s

Perfection

“It may be true that he travels farthest who travels alone, but the goal thus reached is not worth reaching.”

Theodore Roosevelt
Travel

“There can be no life without change, and to be afraid of what is different or unfamiliar is to be afraid of life.”

Theodore Roosevelt
Life , Change

“Each one must do his part if we wish to show that the nation is worthy of its good fortune.”

Theodore Roosevelt

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

Parting

“The corporation is the creature of government, and the people have the right to handle it as they desire; all they need pay attention to is the expediency of realizing this right in some way that shall be productive of good and not harm.”

Theodore Roosevelt

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

People , Way

“The absence of effective State, and, especially, national, restraint upon unfair money-getting has tended to create a small class of enormously wealthy and economically powerful men, whose chief object is to hold and increase their power. The prime need to is to change the conditions which enable these men to accumulate power which it is not for the general welfare that they should hold or exercise.”

Theodore Roosevelt

1910s, The New Nationalism (1910)

Men , Money , Exercises , Change

“Much has been given us, and much will rightfully be expected from us. We have duties to others and duties to ourselves; and we can shirk neither. We have become a great nation, forced by the fact of its greatness into relations with the other nations of the earth, and we must behave as beseems a people with such responsibilities. Toward all other nations, large and small, our attitude must be one of cordial and sincere friendship. We must show not only in our words, but in our deeds, that we are earnestly desirous of securing their good will by acting toward them in a spirit of just and generous recognition of all their rights. But justice and generosity in a nation, as in an individual, count most when shown not by the weak but by the strong.”

Theodore Roosevelt

1900s, Inaugural Address (1905)

Friendship , People , Justice , Strong

“If Congress alters the law and directs me to replace on the coins the sentence in question the direction will be immediately put into effect; but I very earnestly trust that the religious sentiment of the country, the sprit of reverence in this country, will prevent any such action being taken.”

Theodore Roosevelt

1900s, "In God we Trust" letter (1907)

Law , Question , Country

“Death is always and under all circumstances a tragedy, for if it is not, then it means that life itself has become one.”

Theodore Roosevelt

Letter to Cecil Spring-Rice (12 March 1900)
1900s

Life , Death

“If the American people are not fit for popular government, and if they should of right be the servants and not the masters of those whom they themselves put in office, then Lincoln's work was wasted and the whole system of government upon which this great democratic republic rests is a failure.”

Theodore Roosevelt

1910s, California's Policies Proclaimed (Feb. 21, 1911)

People , Failure

“Friends, I shall ask you to be as quiet as possible. I don't know whether you fully understand that I have just been shot; but it takes more than that to kill a Bull Moose.”

Theodore Roosevelt

1910s, Address at Milwaukee, Wisconsin (1912)

Understanding

“Let us speak courteously, deal fairly, and keep ourselves armed and ready.”

Theodore Roosevelt

Address in San Francisco, California (13 May 1903) http://www.trsite.org/content/pages/speaking-loudly
1900s

“To any nation that stands for human liberties, they have an Ally in the United States.”

Theodore Roosevelt

1900s, Address at Providence (1901)

“There are good people who, being discontented with present-day conditions, think that these conditions can be cured by a return to what they call the “principles of the fathers.” […] But to go back to the governmental theories of a hundred years ago would accomplish nothing whatever; for it was under the conditions of unrestricted individualism and freedom from Government interference, countenanced by those theories, that the trusts grew up, and private fortunes, enormous far beyond the deserts of the accumulators were gathered. […] It may be that, in the past development of our country, complete freedom from all restrictions, and the consequent unlimited encouragement and reward given to the most successful industrial leaders, played a part in which the benefits outweighed the disadvantages. But nowadays such is not the case.”

Theodore Roosevelt

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

People , Thinking , Freedom , Success

“What is the lesson to us to-day? Are we to go the way of the older civilizations? The immense increase in the area of civilized activity to-day, so that it is nearly coterminous with the world's surface; the immense increase in the multitudinous variety of its activities; the immense increase in the velocity of the world movement—are all these to mean merely that the crash will be all the more complete and terrible when it comes? We can not be certain that the answer will be in the negative; but of this we can be certain, that we shall not go down in ruin unless we deserve and earn our end. There is no necessity for us to fall; we can hew out our destiny for ourselves, if only we have the wit and the courage and the honesty.”

Theodore Roosevelt

1910s, The World Movement (1910)

World , Way , Courage

“A typical vice of American politics — the avoidance of saying anything real on real issues, and the announcement of radical policies with much sound and fury, and at the same time with a cautious accompaniment of weasel phrases each of which sucks the meat out of the preceding statement.”

Theodore Roosevelt

"Platform Insincerity" in The Outlook, Vol. 101, No. 13 (27 July 1912), p. 660
1910s

Time

“Moreover, every effort should be made under the law to expedite the proceedings of justice in the case of such an awful crime. But it cannot be necessary in order to accomplish this to deprive any citizen of those fundamental rights to be heard in his own defense which are so dear to us all and which lies at the root of our liberty. It certainly ought to be possible by the proper administration of the laws to secure swift vengeance upon the criminal; and the best and immediate efforts of all legislators, judges and citizens should be addressed to securing such reforms in our legal procedure as to leave no vestige of excuse for those misguided men who undertake to reap vengeance through violent methods.”

Theodore Roosevelt

1900s, Letter to Winfield T. Durbin (1903)

Men , Justice , Law , Effort

“The bosses of the Democratic party and the bosses of the Republican party alike have a closer grip than ever before on the party machines in the States and in the Nation. This crooked control of both the old parties by the beneficiaries of political and business privilege renders it hopeless to expect any far-reaching and fundamental service from either.”

Theodore Roosevelt

"Platform Insincerity" in The Outlook, Vol. 101, No. 13 (27 July 1912), p. 660
1910s

Business

“We have a given problem to solve. If we undertake the solution, there is, of course, always danger that we may not solve it aright; but to refuse to undertake the solution simply renders it certain that we cannot possibly solve it aright.”

Theodore Roosevelt The Strenuous Life

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

Problem

“It seems to me that the simple acceptance of this fundamental fact of American life, this acknowledgment that the law of work is the fundamental law of our being, will help us to start aright in facing not a few of the problems that confront us from without and from within. As regards internal affairs, it should teach us the prime need of remembering that, after all has been said and done, the chief factor in any man’s success or failure must be his own character—that is, the sum of his common sense, his courage, his virile energy and capacity. Nothing can take the place of this individual factor.”

Theodore Roosevelt

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

Life , Law , Failure , Courage

“The corporate manager who achieves success by honest efficiency in giving the best service to the public should be favored because we all benefit by his efficiency. […] he should be helped by the Government because his success is good for the National welfare. But a man who, grasps and holds business power by breaking the industrial efficiency of others, who wins success by methods which are against‘ the public interest and degrading to the public morals, should not be permitted to ‘ exercise such power. Instead of punishing him by a long and doubtful process of the law after the wrong has been com- mitted, there should be such effective Government regulation as to check the evil tendencies at the moment that they start do develop.”

Theodore Roosevelt

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

Law , Exercises , Business , Evil

“The collective power of the State can help; but it is the individual’s own power of self-help which is most important.”

Theodore Roosevelt

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

Help

“But we must be ready to face any temporary disaster - whether or not brought on by those who will war against us to the knife — if only through such disaster can we attain our goal.”

Theodore Roosevelt

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

War

“The foreign-born population of this country must be an Americanized population. No other kind can fight the battles of America either in war or peace. It must talk the language of its native-born fellow-citizens; it must possess American citizenship and American ideals. It must stand firm by its oath of allegiance in word and deed and must show that in very fact it has renounced allegiance to every prince, potentate, or foreign government. It must be maintained on an American standard of living so as to prevent labor disturbances in important plants and at critical times. None of these objects can be secured as long as we have immigrant colonies, ghettos, and immigrant sections, and above all they cannot be assured so long as we consider the immigrant only as an industrial asset. The immigrant must not be allowed to drift or to be put at the mercy of the exploiter. Our object is not to imitate one of the older racial types, but to maintain a new American type and then to secure loyalty to this type. We cannot secure such loyalty unless we make this a country where men shall feel that they have justice and also where they shall feel that they are required to perform the duties imposed upon them.”

Theodore Roosevelt

1910s, Address to the Knights of Columbus (1915)
Context: The foreign-born population of this country must be an Americanized population. No other kind can fight the battles of America either in war or peace. It must talk the language of its native-born fellow-citizens; it must possess American citizenship and American ideals. It must stand firm by its oath of allegiance in word and deed and must show that in very fact it has renounced allegiance to every prince, potentate, or foreign government. It must be maintained on an American standard of living so as to prevent labor disturbances in important plants and at critical times. None of these objects can be secured as long as we have immigrant colonies, ghettos, and immigrant sections, and above all they cannot be assured so long as we consider the immigrant only as an industrial asset. The immigrant must not be allowed to drift or to be put at the mercy of the exploiter. Our object is not to imitate one of the older racial types, but to maintain a new American type and then to secure loyalty to this type. We cannot secure such loyalty unless we make this a country where men shall feel that they have justice and also where they shall feel that they are required to perform the duties imposed upon them. The policy of 'Let alone' which we have hitherto pursued is thoroughly vicious from two standpoints. By this policy we have permitted the immigrants, and too often the native-born laborers as well, to suffer injustice. Moreover, by this policy we have failed to impress upon the immigrant and upon the native-born as well that they are expected to do justice as well as to receive justice, that they are expected to be heartily and actively and single-mindedly loyal to the flag no less than to benefit by living under it.

Men , War , Peace , Justice

“Every man among us is more fit to meet the duties and responsibilities of citizenship because of the perils over which, in the past, the nation has triumphed; because of the blood and sweat and tears, the labor and the anguish, through which, in the days that have gone, our forefathers moved on to triumph.”

Theodore Roosevelt

Speech before the Naval War College, Newport, Rhode Island (June 1897), reported in "Washington’s Forgotten Maxim", American Ideals (1926), vol. 13 of The Works of Theodore Roosevelt, national ed., chapter 12, p. 198
1890s

Tear , Past

“If there must be decision by a close majority, then let the people step in and let it be their majority that decides.”

Theodore Roosevelt

1910s, California's Policies Proclaimed (Feb. 21, 1911)

People , Decision

“I'm as strong as a bull moose and you can use me to the limit.”

Theodore Roosevelt

Letter to Mark Hannah (27 June 1900)
1900s

Strong

“Surely, no patriot can fail to see the fearful brutalization and debasement which the indulgence of such a spirit and such practices inevitably portend. Surely, all public men, all writers for the daily press, all clergymen, all teachers, all who in any way have a right to address the public, should, with every energy, unite to denounce such crimes and to support those engaged in putting them down.”

Theodore Roosevelt

1900s, Letter to Winfield T. Durbin (1903)

Men , Fear , Way , Support

“Finally, this world movement of civilization, this movement which is now felt throbbing in every corner of the globe, should bind the nations of the world together while yet leaving unimpaired that love of country in the individual citizen which in the present stage of the world's progress is essential to the world's well-being.”

Theodore Roosevelt

1910s, The World Movement (1910)

Love , World , Country