THEODORE ROOSEVELT 



487 



individualism means unlimited and un- 

 controlled competition and the apotheo- 

 sis of the selfish instinct. It makes no 

 allowances for the principle of handi- 

 cap. Uncontrolled competition means 

 the fattening of the big upon the little. 

 It is the law of the fish-pond, the dog- 

 kennel and the wolf's den. Free com- 

 petition in its larger sense issues in the 

 supremacy of the strong and the cun- 

 ning. The supremacy of the strong 

 issues in the aggrandizement of the 

 strong at the expense of the weak, until 

 there is no more competition or possi- 

 bility of competition. If a dozen wolves 

 are put in a fold with a hundred sheep, 

 on the principle of free competition, 

 there is only one question involved, and 

 that is ho7i' long before the wolves are 

 to acquire all the mutton. 



Mr. Roosevelt decided that the time 

 had come to put a stop to the stock- 

 gamblers' regime. He knew that if he 

 did not do it, the American people 

 would do it in another way. If it were 

 to be done conservatively, it must be 

 done at once. It was for this reason 

 that he stepped out into the arena to 

 do battle, with the spirit of the old 

 gladiators upon him. Indeed, he is not 

 at his worst in this role, this man of 

 peace ! He demanded a "square deal" 

 for the people. He demanded the or- 

 ganization, conservation and use of the 

 national resources. He demanded con- 

 stitutional solidarity in place of the 

 whimsical rule of state rights and Jais- 

 sc::-fairc. He demanded a sovereign 

 for the areas of anarchy between the 

 states, a scourge for the cave-dwellers 

 of lawless wealth and impecunious envy 

 alike, prison bars for the unlawful 

 exploiters of unrequited toil and unpro- 

 tected property. Nemesis for the inso- 

 lent throttlers of competition, gyves for 

 the pirates on the high seas of finance. 



Mr. Roosevelt holds that political 

 responsibilities are immanent : that po- 

 litical relations, as they are objectively 

 expressed in a rational state, are the 

 fulfillment of certain capacities in man, 

 without which he would not be man at 

 all, and that such capacities are ethical. 

 To him politics reveal a body of duties 

 as well as rights, which themselves im- 



ply a common life and a common good. 

 Every measure he has ever proposed, 

 and lost or won, has had its distinctive 

 ethical value. Every "law he has en- 

 forced and every act he has carried 

 through Congress, every measure which 

 through his initiative and support has 

 been written on the statute books of 

 state and Nation, without a single ex- 

 ception, has been in restriction of the 

 field of anarchy in the interest of law 

 and order and equity, and toward the 

 enlargement of the ethical sphere of 

 the State — toward the centralization 

 and rationalization and moralization of 

 its power. 



ETHICAL SPIRIT 



Mr. Roosevelt's contribution is not 

 only that he has given the Nation a 

 new rational and scientific idea, but he 

 has awakened a new ethical spirit. The 

 Hon. William Rodenburg said in Con- 

 gress, last April: "If Theodore Roose- 

 velt had accomplished nothing more 

 than the awakening of the public con- 

 science to a realization of the dangers 

 of corporate encroachment, he would 

 still lead all the men of his day and gen- 

 eration in the great work of practical 

 and permanent reform." The Ameri- 

 can people are no worse than others, 

 and I will not say that they are very 

 much superior, but for some reason or 

 other, until recently, the word "poli- 

 tics" in America always carried with 

 it a reproach. For three-quarters of a 

 century, since the Jacksonian Democ- 

 racy crystallized into practise, the slo- 

 gan was, "To the victor belong the 

 spoils." The very mention of Amer- 

 ican politics had been but a signal, from 

 sheer force of habit, for one hand to 

 fly to one's pocket and the other to 

 one's olfactories, in instinctive self- 

 defense. In the proper sense, we may 

 hardly be said to have had a politics at 

 all. We had a kind of political scrap- 

 book ; we had policies ; we had a polit- 

 ical economy (imported and anti- 

 quated) ; but we have had no political 

 ])hilosophy. Consequently we have had 

 no political ethics. We have developed in 

 many respects political morals, but for 

 a long time we hid these under a bushel, 



