- Theodore Roosevelt and the Harlem Cat Fancier by Michael Patrick Cullinane - pages 7-13
- Theodore Roosevelt and the Troubled Ambassadorship in Washington of Sir Mortimer Durand by Peter Larsen - pages 14-28
- Presidential Snapshot #47 - page 29
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- Seeking to Preserve and to Enhance a Valuable Legacy, Part Two by Duane G. Jundt - pages 30-37
- Theodore Roosevelt and the Conservation of Natural Resources in the Pages of the Theodore Roosevelt Association Journal, 1975-2023 list compiled by Duane G. Jundt - pages 38-43
- Seeking to Preserve and to Enhance a Valuable Legacy (“Part One,” reprinted) by William N. Tilchin - pages 44-71
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Notes from the Editor
It is often said of late that obstacles to preserving constitutional democracy at home and American leadership abroad could be overcome if more public officials “put country before party.” I agree, and there is compelling evidence that a twenty-first-century Theodore Roosevelt would too. This evidence includes TR’s conduct in 1912 and numerous verbal and written statements issued by him over the years, among them this one from 1894: “The party man who offers his allegiance to party as an excuse for blindly following his party, right or wrong, and who fails to try to make that party in any way better, commits a crime against his country.” And also from 1894: “There are times when it may be the duty of a man to break with his party; . . . he must be prepared to leave it when necessary, [although] he must not sacrifice his influence by leaving it unless it is necessary.”
Recently, I received an e-mail message from a longtime member of the Theodore Roosevelt Association Advisory Board, my U.S.-born British friend Professor Douglas Eden, who has authorized me to quote him here. He reports working on “an unusual set of memoirs which reveal my secret membership in what Margaret Thatcher called her ‘irregulars’; how we few Labour officeholders colluded with her to help win her the 1979 election (she credited me with the size of her majority), to defeat Arthur Scargill and his miners who, unknown to them, arranged by Scargill, were directed and funded from Moscow, and to convince Roy Jenkins and David Owen to set up the Social Democratic Party to serve our purpose of successfully depriving Moscow-infiltrated Labour of election” for many years. (Of course, I look forward to reading Prof. Eden’s memoirs when they are published.)
Between the two preceding paragraphs there is clearly a connection. What connects them is the principle that loyalty to country should outweigh loyalty to party.
Obviously, Prof. Eden (who continued to operate as an independent private adviser to Prime Minister Thatcher) and his Labour Party collaborators (some of whom defected to the new Social Democratic Party) put country before party in a successful attempt to prevent the Soviet Union from gaining substantial influence over British foreign policy. Is it not almost a certainty that Theodore Roosevelt (and also Winston Churchill) would have applauded such an example of putting country above party?
If one takes this discussion of Theodore Roosevelt into a contemporary American context, some intriguing questions readily arise. What would TR say and do if he were affiliated with a major party whose leading faction was, in his view, effectively serving the interests of Russian foreign policy rather than U.S. foreign policy? Would he fight from within to change the position of his party? If so, would he nevertheless back some candidates in the opposition party who were steadfast in their determination to thwart Russian designs? Or might he go even farther and actually bolt his party; and would he then proceed to join the opposition party, at least temporarily? In summary—although TR undoubtedly would stand firmly against Vladimir Putin’s Russia and other brutal, dictatorial, anti- American regimes while forcefully advocating for contributing decisively to the defense of the United States’ democratic friends and allies—how exactly would he deal with the unexpected and alarming situation he was confronting? Those exemplary Rooseveltian individuals who appear to me to channel TR most unambiguously in the twenty-first century—particularly notable among them one former member of the U.S. House of Representatives—may provide some excellent clues regarding these and related questions which, however, simply cannot be answered definitively.
William Tilchin
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