ROOSEVELT 



5070 



ROOSEVELT 



1883 he received the vote of the Republicans 

 for speaker, an honor which made him the 

 leader of the minority. Before long, however, 

 the bosses found that "he would not li- 

 reason," and they found a new leader. Roose- 

 velt himself said That this sudden desertion 

 taught him his first real lesson in politics: 



"It was just this; if you are cast on a desert 

 island, with only a sc-row-drlver. a hatchet and a 

 chisel to make a boat with. o make the best 

 one you can. It would be better if you had a 

 saw. hut y..u haven't. S<> with men. There is a 

 point, of course, where a man must take his 

 stand alone and break with all for a clear prin- 

 ciple, but until it comes, he must work with men 

 as they are." 



Although defeated for speaker, and in dis- 

 favor with the bosses, Roosevelt was the most 

 influential man in the assembly, and was al- 

 ready a power to be reckoned with. In 1884 

 he refused to accept another nomination for 

 the legislature, but he attended the state Re- 

 publican convention, which by shrewd tactics 

 he and his friends managed to control. He was 

 elected a delegate-at-large to the national con- 

 vention, and the other delegates made him, a 

 young man just twenty-five years old, the 

 chairman of the delegation from the Empire 

 state. Theodore Roosevelt was a national 

 figure. He worked hard to secure the nomina- 

 tion of George F. Edmunds for President, and 

 bitterly opposed Blaine, but after Elaine was 

 nominated Roosevelt finally decided to vote 

 for him. 



Ranch Life. The year 1884 was a hard one 

 for Roosevelt. His mother died in February; 

 and two days later his wife passed away. He 

 had married in 1880, on his birthday, Miss Alice 

 Lee, of an old Boston family. These domestic 

 sorrows and his political defeats turned his 

 mind from politics. He had previously en- 

 joyed many camping experiences in the Maine 

 woods, but now he turned to the Western 

 prairies. He bought a ranch on the Little Mis- 

 souri, in North Dakota, and made ranching his 

 business. The brand of his Elkhorn Ranch, 

 as he called it, was the Maltese cross. The 

 young master of Elkhorn Ranch courageous, 

 frank, ready to bear his share of work and 

 hardship soon won the respect of the 

 hard men of the Bad Lands. They 

 forgave him his aristocratic ancestry, 

 his New York manners, his Harvard 

 English, his gold-rimmed eye-glasses 

 and even his fringed Angora "chaps," 

 of a kind seldom seen except on the 

 stage. Once he said to a braggart 



who boasted of the number of men he had 

 killed, "Jim, I like you; but you are the nas- 

 tiest talking man I ever heard." And Jim, in- 

 stead of drawing a gun, admitted apologetically 

 that "mebbe I have been too free with my 

 mouth." 



Back in Politics. Roosevelt spent the win- 

 ters of 1884-1885 and 1885-1886 in New York, 

 so he was not entirely out of touch with politi- 

 cal affairs. He spent his vacations on the Elk- 

 horn Ranch for a few years more, but his 

 active ranching career ended in the autumn of 

 1886. He was at Elkhorn when the Inde- 

 pendents and the Republicans nominated him 

 for mayor of New York. Opposing him were 

 Henry George, the Single-Taxer, and Abram 

 Hewitt, the Democratic candidate. There was 

 little chance of election, but Roosevelt con- 

 ducted a lively canvass and felt no disappoint- 

 ment when Hewitt was elected. In December 

 following this defeat, Roosevelt married Miss 

 Edith Kermit Carew, a childhood friend. 



After a honeymoon in Europe, Roosevelt re- 

 turned to New York and renewed his political 

 connections. In 1888 he went on the stump for 

 Harrison, who rewarded him by giving him a 

 place on the Civil Service Commission. While 

 Roosevelt was a member the Commission 

 adopted many measures aimed to bring public 

 employment within reach of the people of all 

 sections and of all parties. It began the prac- 

 tice of holding examinations throughout the 

 country for clerkships in Washington, and 

 greatly extended the scope of the civil service 

 on the basis of "applied idealism," as Roose- 

 velt called it. 



President of the New York Police Commis- 

 sion. After serving on the Civil Service Com- 

 mission from 1889 to 1895, Roosevelt resigned 

 to become president of the police board of New 

 York City. For the next two years he labored 

 to eradicate corruption from the police force 

 and to secure enforcement of the laws. Roose- 

 velt was only one of four members of the 

 board, but he was held responsible by the pub- 

 lic for its entire work. He stopped fflie system, 

 hitherto recognized, by which police officers 

 won promotions by paying money to "the man 

 higher up." Roosevelt was not a mere 

 desk official. He kept in touch with 

 the men on the streets, and any po- 

 liceman might expect that at the next 

 corner he would find himself face to 

 face with his chief. At midnight or 

 in the early hour of the morning the 

 chief would sometimes appear and ask 



