“For an American citizen to vote as a German-American, an Irish-American, or an English-American, is to be a traitor to American institutions; and those hyphenated Americans who terrorize American politicians by threats of the foreign vote are engaged in treason to the American Republic.”

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

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update Sept. 29, 2023. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "For an American citizen to vote as a German-American, an Irish-American, or an English-American, is to be a traitor to …" by Theodore Roosevelt?
Theodore Roosevelt photo
Theodore Roosevelt 445
American politician, 26th president of the United States 1858–1919

Related quotes

Frank McCourt photo

“It's not enough to be American. You always have to be something else, Irish-American, German-American, and you'd wonder how they'd get along if someone hadn't invented the hyphen”

§14
'Tis (2000)
Source: ' Tis: a Memoir
Context: Why is it the minute I open my mouth the whole world is telling me they're Irish and we should all have a drink? It's not enough to be American. You always have to be something else, Irish-American, German-American, and you'd wonder how they'd get along if someone hadn't invented the hyphen.

Mitch McConnell photo

“African American voters are voting in just as high a percentage as Americans.”

Mitch McConnell (1942) US Senator from Kentucky, Senate Majority Leader

Source: "Virginia congressman blasts McConnell for comment on voters of color" https://edition.cnn.com/2022/01/20/politics/mcconnell-voters-of-color-criticism-mceachin/index.html, CNN, January 21 2022

Theodore Roosevelt photo

“The man who calls himself an American citizen and who yet shows by his actions that he is primarily the citizen of a foreign land, plays a thoroughly mischievous part in the life of our body politic. He has no place here; and the sooner he returns to the land to which he feels his real heart allegiance, the better it will be for every good American. There is no such thing as a hyphenated American who is a good American. The only man who is a good American is the man who is an American and nothing else.”

Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919) American politician, 26th president of the United States

1910s, Address to the Knights of Columbus (1915)
Context: The one absolutely certain way of bringing this nation to ruin, of preventing all possibility of its continuing to be a nation at all, would be to permit it to become a tangle of squabbling nationalities, an intricate knot of German-Americans, Irish-Americans, English-Americans, French-Americans, Scandinavian-Americans or Italian-Americans, each preserving its separate nationality, each at heart feeling more sympathy with Europeans of that nationality, than with the other citizens of the American Republic. The men who do not become Americans and nothing else are hyphenated Americans; and there ought to be no room for them in this country. The man who calls himself an American citizen and who yet shows by his actions that he is primarily the citizen of a foreign land, plays a thoroughly mischievous part in the life of our body politic. He has no place here; and the sooner he returns to the land to which he feels his real heart allegiance, the better it will be for every good American. There is no such thing as a hyphenated American who is a good American. The only man who is a good American is the man who is an American and nothing else.

Dave Dellinger photo

“Henceforth, no decent citizen owes one scrap of allegiance (if he ever did) to American law, American custom or American institutions.”

Dave Dellinger (1915–2004) American activist

Context: The way of life that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki and is reported to have roasted alive a million people in Tokyo overnight is international and dominates every nation of the world, but we live in the United States, so our struggle is here. With this way of life, death would be more appropriate. There could be no truce or quarter. The prejudices of patriotism, the pressures of our friends and fear of unpopularity and death should not hold us back any longer. It should be total war against the economic and political and social system which is dominant in this country. The American system has been destroying human life in peace and in war, at home and abroad for decades. Now it has produced the growing infamy of atom bombing. Besides these brutal facts, the tidbits of democracy mean nothing. Henceforth, no decent citizen owes one scrap of allegiance (if he ever did) to American law, American custom or American institutions.

Pauli Murray photo

“I want to be an American — without the hyphen.”

Pauli Murray (1910–1985) American writer, activist and lawyer

[Sadler, Betty, She Refuses To Leave Leadership To "Spoilers', The State, 10 November 1967, Columbia, SC, 3−B]

Theodore Roosevelt photo

“In this country we have no place for hyphenated Americans.”

Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919) American politician, 26th president of the United States
Calvin Coolidge photo

“Parties do not maintain themselves. They are maintained by effort. The government is not self-existent. It is maintained by the effort of those who believe in it. The people of America believe in American institutions, the American form of government and the American method of transacting business.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

As quoted in Manuscripts: speeches and messages of Calvin Coolidge, 1895–1924, the Massachusetts State Library, George Fingold Library, Boston.
1920s, Speech to the the Republican Commercial Travelers' Club (1920)

Lyndon B. Johnson photo
Toni Morrison photo

“In this country American means white. Everybody else has to hyphenate.”

Toni Morrison (1931–2019) American writer

The Guardian (29 January 1992)

Related topics