Note Page 30“ Roosevelt and Taft”

Social Studies

By Morgan J. Burris Lexington Middle School

Video Clip Intro

• The Progressive Era by Media Rich Learning

Theodore Roosevelt

• Rose steadily through gov’t ranks

• Spanish American War: hero leader of Rough Riders at

San Juan Hill in Cuba

• Gov. of NY

reform governor

• Vice President of William McKinley

• Became President with McKinley’s assassination

became youngest president in US history- 42 years old

Death of President McKinley

Square Deal

- Very Spirited Leader

• Presidency as the “bully pulpit”

• He serves as the protector of the people

use the Presidency to influence legislation

• Square Deal was his program to fix the evils of

society through Progressive reforms

• ”Politics is the art of the possible”

• ”Speak softly and carry a big stick”

Photo Biography Of Teddy Roosevelt

White House Pets!!!

• Our 26th President, Theodore Roosevelt, began his Presidency in 1901, along with six children and more animals than the White House had ever seen.   The Roosevelt children's family of pets included a small bear named Jonathan Edwards; a lizard named Bill; guinea pigs named Admiral Dewey, Dr. Johnson, Bishop Doane, Fighting Bob Evans, and Father O'Grady; Maude the pig; Josiah the badger; Eli Yale the blue macaw; Baron Spreckle the hen; a one-legged rooster; a hyena; a barn owl; Peter the rabbit; and Algonquin the pony.   President Roosevelt loved the pets as much as his children did.   Algonquin was so beloved that when the President's son Archie was sick in bed, his brothers Kermit and Quentin brought the pony up to his room in the elevator.   But Algonquin was so captivated by his own reflection in the elevator mirror that it was hard to get him out!

• Quentin once stopped in a pet store and bought four snakes.   He then went to show them to his father in the Oval Office, where the President was holding an important meeting.   Senators and party officials smiled tolerantly when the boy barged in and hugged his father.   But when Quentin dropped the snakes on the table, the officials scrambled for safety.   The snakes were eventually captured and promptly sent back to the pet shop.   Alice, Quentin's sister, also had a pet garter snake that she named Emily Spinach ("because it was as green as spinach and as thin as my Aunt Emily").

• The Roosevelts were dog lovers as well.   Among their many canines were Sailor Boy the Chesapeake retriever, Jack the terrier, Skip the mongrel, and Pete, a bull terrier who sank his teeth into so many legs that he had to be exiled to the Roosevelt home in Long Island!   Alice had a small black Pekingese named Manchu, which she received from the last empress of China during a trip to the Far East.   Alice once claimed to have seen Manchu dancing on its hind legs in the moonlight on the White House lawn.

Teddy Roosevelt and the Building of the

Panama Canal

Gov’t Involvement

• 1902 coal strike• 140,000 workers from PA went on strike.

• mine owners refused to bargain

• Strike threaten fuel needs of the nation; hospitals were

freezing

• Roosevelt had both groups to meet in DC and go to arbitration= an impartial

outside committee resolved the strike

• Set an example of Presidents mediating

conflicts

• -workers got 10% raise, 9-hour workday but cant

strike for 3 years

Trustbusting Trusts controlled 4/5 of

industry

Roosevelt believed in good and bad trusts= bad trusts greedily abused the public

Several trusts were broken and real gov’t regulation

began

RR regulation 1904

Northern Securities v. US

Supreme Court ordered dissolution of Northern

Securities Company which had monopoly over RR rates

in NW

Trustbusting

Roosevelt filed 44 lawsuits against America’s largest

trusts including:

Tobacco, Oil, and Beef

Railroad Regulation:

Elkins Act: put some teeth in the Interstate Commerce

Commission (ICC) making it illegal for RR officials to give or

receive rebates

Hepburn Act: limited the distribution of free RR passes, and gave the ICC the power to

set maximum RR rates

Both boosted the GOV’T power to REGULATE industry

The Jungle

Written by Upton Sinclair

Muckraking novel

Meant to expose the conditions of immigrants

Impact of novel was the description of meatpacking industry

Gov’t Action-investigated Sinclair’s claims

-passed Meat Inspection Act, 1906

-later passage of Pure Food and Drug Act

-FDA: can not sale any contaminated food or medicine= required

LABELING!

Conservation

Industry was consuming large portions of natural

resources

Pollution was destroying waterways

Established several national parks

Set aside large portions of forestlands: 148 million acres

Gifford Pinchot: named head of US Forest Service, famous Conservationist

Development of land for the common good

John MuirTeddy

Conservation

Newlands Reclamation Act: money from the sale of public lands in the West

funded large scale irrigation projects such as the

Roosevelt dam

- Showed that the federal gov’t would manage the precious water source of

the West

Gifford Pinchot ►

Civil Rights-Progressive era as a whole

ignored the needs of minorities

-Booker T. Washington: Tuskegee Institute- advocated for vocational training for Af.Am

-W.E.B. DuBois: advocated for immediate social and economic equality for Af. Am.

NAACP: Association for the Advancement of Colored People

- Equality for all races

Taft Elected Roosevelt serves two terms

William Howard Taft designated to replace him

Taft never wanted or liked being President

Reluctant to use Presidency as bully pulpit

Activities Roosevelt earned name

as trustbuster

Taft breaks up twice as many trusts in half the

time

Tried to lowers tariffs: signed Payne-Aldrich Tariff, but didn’t lower

them enough

Angered the conservation movement

by opening up gov’t lands

Fires Pinchot

Taft’s StrugglesProgressive and

conservative parts of party begin to fight

Speaker Joe Cannon

Old style conservative goals clashed with

progressives

Republicans argue over party goals and leaders

Republicans lose control of H.O.R.

TR decides to try for third term

Taft and Roosevelt vie for 1912 party nomination

Video Clips

• History Channel’s Presidents of the

United States Episode 5

• Start around Minute 22: Starts at McKinley’s

assassination, covers Teddy Roosevelt

• History Channel’s Presidents of the

United States Episode 5

• Start around Minute 37 for President

William Taft

Note Page 30“ Roosevelt and Taft”

The End

By Morgan J. Burris Lexington Middle School