The Army as it is now is as small as it can possibly be and serve its purpose as an effective nucleus for the organization, equipment, and supply of a volunteer army in time of need.
Teddy Roosevelt
The Public Record
Theodore Roosevelt was the 26th President of the United States, serving from 1901 to 1909. A member of the Republican Party, he was born on October 27, 1858, in New York. Roosevelt was a prominent leader of the Progressive Movement, advocating for domestic policies that included trust-busting, regulation of corporations, and conservation of natural resources. His administration is noted for significant reforms and the establishment of national parks and forests.
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It is not creditable to us as a nation that our great export and import trade should be wellnigh exclusively in the hands of foreigners.
Whatever makes to the advantage of one is equally to the advantage of the other.
The two industries have become, under the economic policy of our Government, so closely interwoven, so mutually interdependent, that neither can hope to maintain itself at the high-water mark of progress without the other.
On the other hand, the debt of the farmers to the manufacturers is equally heavy, and the future of American agriculture is bound up in the future of American manufactures.
Nine-tenths of all the raw materials of every kind and description consumed in American manufactories are of American production.
Evidently the manufacturer is the farmer’s best and most direct customer.
Long ago overproduction would have checked the marvelous development of our national agriculture, but for the steadily increasing demand of American manufacturers for farm products required as raw materials for steadily expanding…
In the forty years ending in 1900 the total value of farm property increased twelve and a half billions of dollars; the farmer gaining even more during this period than the manufacturer.
American farmers have prospered because the growth of their market has kept pace with the growth of their farms.
All other classes depend upon the farmer, but the farmer in turn depends upon the market they furnish him for his produce.
The men on those six million farms receive from the protective tariff what they most need, and that is the best of all possible markets.
The six million farms of the United States, operated by men who, as a class, are steadfast, single-minded, and industrious, form the basis of all the other achievements of the American people and are more fruitful than all their other…
The most welcome and impressive fact established by the last census is the wide and even distribution of wealth among all classes of our countrymen.
At no time in the history of this or any other country has there been an era so productive of material benefit alike to workingman and employer as during the seven years that have just passed.
The accumulated savings of the workingmen of the country, as shown by the deposits in the savings banks, have increased by leaps and bounds.
As conclusively shown by the bulletins of the Bureau of Labor, the purchasing power of the average wage received by the wage-worker has grown faster than the cost of living, and this in spite of the continual shortening of working hours.
The wage-worker would do well to remember that if protection is “robbery,” and is to be punished accordingly, he will be the first to pay the penalty; for either he will be turned adrift entirely, or his wages will be cut down to the…
But it is no less true that it is our economic policy as regards the tariff and finance which has enabled us as a nation to make such good use of the individual capacities of our citizens, and the natural resources of our country.
Beyond question this prosperity could not have come if the American people had not possessed the necessary thrift, energy, and business intelligence to turn their vast material resources to account.
Our laws should in no event afford advantage to foreign industries over American industries.
At all hazards, and no matter what else is sought for or accomplished by changes of the tariff, the American workingman must be protected in his standard of wages, that is, in his standard of living, and must be secured the fullest…
The one consideration which must never be omitted in a tariff change is the imperative need of preserving the American standard of living for the American workingman.
Moreover, there can be no reciprocity unless there is a substantial tariff; free trade and reciprocity are not compatible.
In other words, our opponents have committed themselves to the destruction of the protective principle in the tariff, using words which if honestly used forbid them from permitting this principle to obtain in even the smallest degree.
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