Details
ROOSEVELT, Theodore. Typed letter signed ("Theodore Roosevelt") as President, to Dr. Lyman Abbott, with 15-word autograph addition, Washington, D.C., 26 September 1904. 1½ pages, 4to (7½ x 7 in.), White House stationery, in fine condition. Matted and framed with a portrait of Roosevelt.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON AND ROOSEVELT'S "POLICY OF DOING JUSTICE TO THE NEGRO"
Roosevelt sends a letter and editorial to his friend and admirer, Lyman Abbott, editor of The Outlook and adds spirited comments on those who have accused him of racial bias in his appointments in southern states: "Mind you, what I have done in Alabama I have done everywhere else in the South, and with all the venomous attacks upon me, the southerners who make the attacks can not deny that I have elevated the public standard by by appointments in the South; and curously enough, I have appointed fewer colored men than my predecessor. Have you noticed that Collier's Weekly attacks me because I have gone too far in my policy of doing justice to the Negro while the Evening Post declines to support me because I have not gone far enough!...The Pittsburg Post's statement is, of course, a pure lie. I have in no State constituted a board of white and negro politicians, to whom has been committed the control of the federal patronage. As a matter of fact, the only negro whom I have consulted about appointments in the South has been Booker Washington. It does seem to me that this issue is far more than merely political. If a man like Carl Schurz had one particle of intellectual and political honesty in his make-up, he could not support the Democrats in this campaign in view of their attitude to the South of his own recent utterances on this very question."
Roosevelt's forward-thinking attitude toward race caught him in a political and social catch-22. His attraction to Booker T. Washington was based on the fact the great educator preached an evolutionary policy rather than agitation or violence. Roosevelt's meetings with Washington in 1901 convinced him that Roosevelt "wanted to help not only the Negro, but the whole South." To ensure getting the 1904 presidential nomination, Roosevelt began to build up alliances in the South, and was often met with opposition. Washington was invited to the White House in October 1901 to discuss with Roosevelt, then still Vice President, concerns about the South. Despite efforts to avoid publicity, news that a black man had dined in the White House reached the papers and infuriated many Southerners. The Memphis Scimitar called the dinner "the most damnable outrage ever," while "blacks... sized up the dinner as a fragment of hope amid a rising tide of discrimination" (Nathan Miller, Theodore Roosevelt: A Life, New York, 1992, pp. 361-363). Because of Roosevelt's public attention to Washington, criticisms continued that he favored the Southern black cause; equally, reformers felt he was not doing enough.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON AND ROOSEVELT'S "POLICY OF DOING JUSTICE TO THE NEGRO"
Roosevelt sends a letter and editorial to his friend and admirer, Lyman Abbott, editor of The Outlook and adds spirited comments on those who have accused him of racial bias in his appointments in southern states: "Mind you, what I have done in Alabama I have done everywhere else in the South, and with all the venomous attacks upon me, the southerners who make the attacks can not deny that I have elevated the public standard by by appointments in the South; and curously enough, I have appointed fewer colored men than my predecessor. Have you noticed that Collier's Weekly attacks me because I have gone too far in my policy of doing justice to the Negro while the Evening Post declines to support me because I have not gone far enough!...The Pittsburg Post's statement is, of course, a pure lie. I have in no State constituted a board of white and negro politicians, to whom has been committed the control of the federal patronage. As a matter of fact, the only negro whom I have consulted about appointments in the South has been Booker Washington. It does seem to me that this issue is far more than merely political. If a man like Carl Schurz had one particle of intellectual and political honesty in his make-up, he could not support the Democrats in this campaign in view of their attitude to the South of his own recent utterances on this very question."
Roosevelt's forward-thinking attitude toward race caught him in a political and social catch-22. His attraction to Booker T. Washington was based on the fact the great educator preached an evolutionary policy rather than agitation or violence. Roosevelt's meetings with Washington in 1901 convinced him that Roosevelt "wanted to help not only the Negro, but the whole South." To ensure getting the 1904 presidential nomination, Roosevelt began to build up alliances in the South, and was often met with opposition. Washington was invited to the White House in October 1901 to discuss with Roosevelt, then still Vice President, concerns about the South. Despite efforts to avoid publicity, news that a black man had dined in the White House reached the papers and infuriated many Southerners. The Memphis Scimitar called the dinner "the most damnable outrage ever," while "blacks... sized up the dinner as a fragment of hope amid a rising tide of discrimination" (Nathan Miller, Theodore Roosevelt: A Life, New York, 1992, pp. 361-363). Because of Roosevelt's public attention to Washington, criticisms continued that he favored the Southern black cause; equally, reformers felt he was not doing enough.