“What we should desire to find out is the individual quality of the individual man”

— Theodore Roosevelt

As quoted in The Business of Transatlantic Migration between Europe and the United States, 1900–1914 (2012), by Drew Keeling, p. 161
1900s, Message to Congress (1905)
Context: It is unwise to depart from the old American tradition and discriminate for or against any man who desires to come here and become a citizen, save on the ground of that man's fitness for citizenship.... We can not afford to consider whether he is Catholic or Protestant, Jew or Gentile; whether he is Englishman or Irishman, Frenchman or German, Japanese, Italian, or Scandinavian, or Magyar. What we should desire to find out is the individual quality of the individual man.

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Theodore Roosevelt 445

American politician, 26th president of the United States 1858–1919

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“What we should desire to find out is the individual quality of the individual man”

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Theodore Roosevelt 445

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