The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt

by Edmund Morris

  At the end of February, Bamie wrote to say that Elliott, surprisingly, had already placed himself in the Marien Grund Sanctuary at Graz. He was in a highly excitable state, bursting into tears at the slightest hint of disapproval, so she would wait until he was stronger before telling him about Katy Mann. The incarceration was to last three months. Although Theodore was pessimistic about the effects of so short a stay in so luxurious a retreat, he was relieved for Anna’s sake—“Elliott is purely secondary.”14 With neither of his brother’s babies due until the spring,15 he could devote his full attention to Civil Service matters.

  IT HAPPENED THAT Roosevelt’s family troubles during the early part of 1891 coincided with a period of renewed political difficulties. At times he felt he was “battling with everybody … the little gray man in the White House looking on with cold and hesitating disapproval.”16 The struggle was provoked by his efforts to extend the classification of the Civil Service to all offices in the Indian Bureau. Rioting by Sioux in South Dakota reservations, where maladministration and corruption were rife, had forced him to rethink his old paternal attitudes to the red man, and he now tried to persuade Administration officials that Indians should take part wherever possible in agency affairs. “I should take the civilized members of the different tribes and put them to work in instructing their fellows in farming, blacksmithing and the like, and should extend the present system of paid Indian judges and police.” But the officials were apathetic, and President Harrison flatly refused to admit that conditions on the reservations were bad.17

  February saw the usual appropriations crisis in Congress. Republican spoilsmen lobbied to such good effect that for two days the Civil Service Commission was in danger of losing its entire operating budget. Speaker Reed had to use his massive personal influence before the funds were voted on 14 February.18

  With the departure of Congress in early March, pressure on the Civil Service Commission finally eased, and Roosevelt found himself with little official work to do. His thoughts began to drift toward literature again, for the first reviews of his History of the City of New York19 were flowing in from both sides of the Atlantic.

  THE BRITISH CRITICS were complimentary, if not enthusiastic. It was felt that Roosevelt had done as well as could be expected, given the largeness of his subject and the limitations of his space. New York was “pleasantly written,” remarked the Spectator, but as a story it was not inspiring. Roosevelt had been unable to prove that the city’s rapid growth had been to any good purpose. “An hour in New York suffices to inform the observing foreigner that it is among the worst-governed, worst-paved, worst-built, and worst-ordered cities in the world.” Still, one had to admire Roosevelt’s condemnation of municipal corruption and his freedom from “any trace of Chauvinism.”20

  It was left to an American periodical, the Nation, to point out that on the contrary Roosevelt was very chauvinistic indeed. The anonymous reviewer sounded a complaint that would be heard with increasing frequency during the next ten years: “Mr. Roosevelt preaches too much. He lays down the singular proposition that a feeling of broad, radical, intense Americanism is necessary if good work is to be done in any direction … The sooner we get over talking about ‘American’ systems of philosophy, and ethics, and art, and devote ourselves to what is true, and right, and beautiful, the sooner we shall shake off our provincialism.”21

  The most that can be said of New York today is that it is a piece of honorable hackwork, tightly written, unflawed by any trace of originality. One or two passages are of semiautobiographical interest (Roosevelt can never resist injecting himself and his personal opinions into a historical narrative), and his command of urban details is at least as impressive as that of Western material in his earlier histories. The section dealing with the unprecedented tidal wave of immigration that battered New York after the War of 1812 is an early example of Roosevelt’s fascination with “ethnic turnover,” as he called it. “The public-school system and the all-pervading energy of American life proved too severe solvents to be resisted even by the German tenacity … The children of the first generation were half, and the grandchildren in most cases wholly, Americanized—to their own inestimable advantage.” There is also a characteristic passage that describes policemen attacking the Draft Rioters “with the most wholesome intent to do them physical harm.” Thirty rioters were slain “—an admirable object-lesson to the remainder.”22

  ROOSEVELT WAS WORKING in his office on the afternoon of Tuesday, 24 March—regretting that there was just enough paper on his desk to keep him from The Winning of the West23—when a Mr. John C. Rose of Baltimore was shown in. Rose was counsel to the Maryland Civil Service Reform League, and as such considered himself a watchdog over the law in his hometown. He had serious irregularities to report.

  A Republican primary was scheduled in Baltimore for the following Monday, Rose explained. Its purpose was to elect delegates to the Maryland State Convention, which would in turn establish procedures for the election of delegates to the National Convention in 1892.24 At the moment things were not going well for the friends of Benjamin Harrison. It looked as if the city might choose an anti-Administration slate; in that case the President could forget about Maryland’s votes when he ran for renomination. As a result, the local postmaster and U.S. marshal—both Harrison appointees—were using their offices as emergency campaign chests. Senior federal employees were going around “assessing” subordinates for contributions ranging from $5 to $10 each.25 This was in open defiance of Section One of the Civil Service Code, prohibiting the solicitation of money for political purposes on government property. The money would certainly be used to bribe election judges on Monday, and there was no saying what other means the pro-Administration forces might use to influence the course of the voting. Rose begged Roosevelt to come down and investigate the situation at once: several witnesses were prepared to testify to the truth of his allegations.26

  Roosevelt proved oddly coy. Although he did not say as much to Rose, he dreaded another contretemps with the Postmaster General—which would surely occur should he uncover further evidence of politicking in that gentleman’s department. Wanamaker had been smarting ever since the Paul/Shidy affair, and if stung once more could be expected to fight tooth and nail for Roosevelt’s removal.

  Stalling for time, the Commissoner asked Rose to return to Baltimore and put his information in writing. When the letter arrived two days later he sent it on to Wanamaker, suggesting that as most of the allegations therein referred to the Post Office, the Postmaster General should perhaps investigate them himself. Wanamaker declined.27 Roosevelt felt he had done what he could to protect the Administration, and must now do his duty. With his usual flair for the dramatic, he chose to arrive in Baltimore unannounced, on the morning of Election Day, 30 March.28

  As he wandered through the noisy wards he saw enough evidence of wanton illegality by federal employees to fill a fleet of police wagons. He tried to maintain an air of official disapproval, but the writer in him could not help rejoicing in scenes and incidents straight out of Pickwick Papers. On every sidewalk fists flew and money—taxpayers’ money—changed hands, while in house-windows overlooking the street, election judges sat in impassive groups of three, like monkeys who saw, heard, and spoke no evil. Relays of furniture carts rumbled in from all points of the compass, bringing hundreds of rural voters with no apparent connections to the local Republican party. Ward-workers entertained these transients in saloons where the beer flowed freely, compliments of Postmaster Johnson and Marshal Airey. Countless “pudding” tickets (six or seven slips folded together as one) were deposited on behalf of both factions; when a judge objected to this, his two colleagues threw him bodily into the crowd. Elsewhere an anti-Administration worker eliminated three pro-Administration judges by the simple expedient of pulling a blind down over their window. “On account of this excessive zeal,” wrote Roosevelt admiringly, “he was taken to the watch-house and fined.”29

  The polls clo
sed at eight o’clock, and although there seemed to be three to four times as many votes as voters, the majority were clearly in favor of the anti-Administration forces. Roosevelt had no comment to make: he was busy interviewing federal employees who had contributed to, or participated in, the day’s proceedings.30 Not one of them saw anything wrong in influencing the course of a political election. “As far as I could find out,” Roosevelt recalled, “… there seemed to be no question of principle at stake at all, but one of offices merely … it was not a primary which particularly affected the interest of private citizens.” The civil servants of Baltimore, he added, “were as thorough believers in a system of oligarchical government as if they had lived in Venice or Sparta.”31

  Party reaction to his visit was immediate and violent. On 1 April the Washington correspondent of the Boston Post reported: “The removal of Theodore Roosevelt from the Civil Service Commission is among the possibilities of the near future.” The President, apparently, was “very mad” with him.32 Frank Hatton delightedly fanned the flames with a front-page story headlined “TEDDY AT THE POLLS—Helping To Hurt Mr. Harrison—He Is Hand-in-Glove with the Anti-Administration Men.” The article alleged that Roosevelt’s tour through the wards had caused many government employees to “desert the field,” resulting in a humiliating defeat for the Administration. “If the delegation sent to the next nominating convention is anti-Harrison, the President will have nobody to blame more than his Civil Service Commissioner.”33

  On 4 April, an incensed party of Maryland spoilsmen visited the White House to demand Roosevelt’s dismissal.34 Harrison said he would wait for an official report of the investigation before deciding what to do. This was a clear warning to Roosevelt to modify, delay, or even suppress any embarrassing findings.

  Aware that he had an ax hanging over him35—an ax that threatened to split asunder not only the Civil Service Commission, but the entire Administration—Roosevelt drafted his report with extreme caution. He returned to Baltimore three times, on 6, 13, and 18 April, to gather extra material.36 Every word of testimony was transcribed by a stenographer, lest the President doubt any of the evidence. Some interviews, despite his efforts to be severe, came out like music-hall dialogue:

  Q. How do you do your cheating?

  A. Well, we do our cheating honorably.37

  Although Roosevelt quoted such non sequiturs with relish, the cheerful mendacity of witness after witness gradually sickened him. Out of their own mouths, he wrote, no fewer than twenty-five Harrison appointees stood convicted, and the President should dismiss them at once. His analysis of the evidence contained a typically aggressive plea for the abolition of the spoils system, on the grounds of pure political morality. “Resolved into its ultimate elements, the view of the spoils politician is that politics is a dirty game, which ought to be played solely by those who desire, by hook or crook, to win pecuniary reward [in] the form of money or of office. Politics cannot possibly be put upon a healthy basis until this idea is absolutely eradicated … As for the Government officeholder, he must be taught in one way or another that his duty is to do the work of the Government for the whole people, and not to pervert his office for the use of any party or any faction.”38

  In conclusion, Roosevelt noted that Postmaster Johnson had weakly disclaimed responsibility for the politicking of his employees. Such men were loyal, not to him, but to their ward leaders, who had ordered Johnson to hire them in the first place. “This testimony,” Roosevelt remarked contemptuously, “… shows the utter nonsense of the talk that under the spoils system the appointing officers themselves make the appointments. They do nothing of the kind … outside politicians make the appointments for them.” There was not enough evidence to warrant indictment of either Johnson or Marshal Airey—although the latter had been seen tearing the coat-buttons off a recalcitrant judge. In an obvious attempt to placate the President, Roosevelt avoided direct censure of either official, but suggested that in future any such politicking by senior civil servants “shall be treated as furnishing cause for dismissal.”39

  THE REPORT OF COMMISSIONER Roosevelt Concerning Political Assessments and the Use of Official Influence to Control Elections in the Federal Offices at Baltimore, Maryland40 was, and remains, a masterpiece in its genre. It was short (146 pages), dense with relevant information, yet so clearly written as to speed both reader and author irresistibly to the same conclusion. Indeed the document was so seductive, not to say seditious, in its indictment of Old Guard Republicanism that Roosevelt himself seems to have had second thoughts about sending it in, or at least to have yielded to the suggestions of Commissioners Lyman and Thompson that he delay its release until the summer vacations, when negative publicity would do the Administration least harm.41

  As a result, he enjoyed a temporary lull in his “warfare with the ungodly,” and drifted into “the pleasant life one can lead in Washington in the spring, if there are several tolerably intimate families.”42 The Roosevelts dined the Reeds; the Reeds responded with lunch; the Hays dined the Roosevelts; and “good, futile, pathetic Springy” entertained everybody at the country club. Theodore and Edith made side trips to Senator Cameron’s estate in Pennsylvania, and to William Merritt Chase’s art studio in New York, where Carmencita performed the new dance sensation, flamenco. April was effulgent, “clear as a bell … the flowers in bloom, and the trees a fresh and feathery green.” There were moonlight drives along the Potomac, followed by dinner; receptions for “various Dago diplomats,” followed by dinner; lazy Saturday lunches and lingering Sunday teas, followed by yet more dinners.43 Roosevelt, whose body was thickening steadily with age, attempted to lose weight by trotting up Rock Creek in heavy flannels. His Dutch Reformed conscience began to bother him. “I have been going out too much … I wish I had more chance to work at my books … I don’t feel as if I were working to lasting effect.”44

  SOMETIME THAT SPRING he was overjoyed to receive a “temperate, natural, truthful” letter from his brother, whom Bamie had at last told about Katy Mann. It amounted to a total rejection of the girl’s story.45 Naively reassured, Theodore wondered if he should call her bluff. “It is a ticklish business,” he told Bamie. “I hate the idea of [a] public scandal; and yet I never believe in yielding a hair’s breadth to a case of simple blackmail.”46

  But Katy Mann—who had given birth to a son—was not in the least deterred from pressing her suit. She claimed that Elliott had given her a locket and some compromising letters, which she would be happy to produce in court. Other servants, moreover, were willing to testify that he had been infatuated with her, and that his voice had been heard in her room. “Of course she is lying,” Theodore wrote uneasily.47

  He was still wondering how to proceed when the reports from Europe took on a sudden, alarming turn. Elliott had quit the sanitarium in Graz on some wild impulse, and had dragged Anna, Bamie, and the children to Paris. There he had taken on an American mistress, a Mrs. Evans, begun to drink again, and was occasionally so violent as to frighten Anna into hysterics.48 Theodore chafed with frustration. Were it not for the fact that his own wife was heavily pregnant, he would have taken the next ship to Paris. He insisted, in a brutally decisive letter dated 7 June, that Elliott must be left to drink himself to death, if necessary, the moment Anna’s confinement was over.

  Anna must be made to understand that it is both maudlin and criminal—I am choosing my words with scientific exactness—to continue living with Elliott … Do everything to persuade her to come home at once, unless Elliott will put himself in an asylum for a term of years, or unless, better still, he will come too. Once here I’ll guarantee to see that he is shut up …

  Make up your mind to one dreadful scene. Use this letter if you like. Tell him that he is either responsible or irresponsible. If responsible then he must go where he can be cured; if irresponsible he is simply a selfish brutal and vicious criminal, and Anna ought not to stay with him an hour.

  Do not care an atom for his threats of going off al
one. Let him go … What happens to him is of purely minor importance now; and the chance of public scandal must not be weighed for a moment against the welfare, the life, of Anna and the children …

  If he can’t be shut up, and will neither go of his own accord, nor let Anna depart of his free will, then make your plans and go off some day in his absence. If you need me telegraph me, and I (or Douglas [Robinson] if it is impossible for me to go on account of Edith) will come at once. But remember, I come on one condition. I come to settle the thing once and for all … You can tell him that Anna has a perfect right to a divorce; she or you or I have but to express belief in the Katy Mann story and no jury in the country would refuse a divorce.

  Notwithstanding his threat to uphold Katy Mann in court, Theodore still wanted to believe that the girl was lying.49 As a gentleman he had to accept his brother’s denial until it was proved false. He therefore ordered his representatives “to tell her to go on with her law suit … she will get nothing from us.” Senior members of the family were alerted to the likelihood of “some pretty ugly matters” surfacing in the press.50

  At this point another letter arrived from Elliott,51 reiterating his innocence but authorizing Theodore to pay Katy Mann “a moderate sum” in exchange for a quit claim. The lawyers suggested three thousand dollars, rising to four if necessary.52 That was much more than Elliott had in mind, but they reminded Theodore that in cases of this kind, involving boozy playboys and humble servant girls, the jury’s sympathy was always with the plaintiff. In a letter to “dear old Nell,” dated 14 June 1891, Theodore tried desperately to convince his brother—and himself—that the amount was worth paying.

  If you and I were alone in the world I should advise fighting her as a pure blackmailer, yet as things [are] I did not dare …