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The Party Belongs To The Millions Of The Rank And File. It Does Not Belong To The Handful Of Politicians Who Have Assumed Fraudulently To Upset The Will Of The Rank And File. The Action Of These Men Is In No Sense "regular," As They Claim It To Be.... Theft And Dishonesty Cannot Give And Never Shall Give A Title To Regularity.

-Theodore Roosevelt

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The Party Belongs To

Theodore Roosevelt

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The Party Belongs To The Millions Of The Rank And File. It Does Not Belong To The Handful Of Politicians Who Have Assumed Fraudulently To Upset The Will Of The Rank And File. The Action Of These Men Is In No Sense "regular," As They Claim It To Be.... Theft And Dishonesty Cannot Give And Never Shall Give A Title To Regularity.

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There Can Be No Effective Control Of Corporations While Their Political Activity Remains. To Put An End To It Will Be Neither A Short Nor An Easy Task, But It Can Be Done ... Corporate Expenditures For Political Purposes, And Especially Such Expenditures By Public-service Corporations, Have Supplied One Of The Principal Sources Of Corruption In Our Political Affairs.

War With Evil; But Show No Spirit Of Malignity Toward The Man Who May Be Responsible For The Evil. Put It Out Of His Power To Do Wrong.

There Is But One Answer To Terrorism And It Is Best Delivered With A Winchester Rifle.

The Man Who Loves Other Countries As Much As His Own Stands On A Level With The Man Who Loves Other Women As Much As He Loves His Own Wife.

When I Hear Of The Destruction Of A Species, I Feel Just As If All The Works Of Some Great Writer Have Perished.

I Wish To Preach Not The Doctrine Of Ignoble Ease But The Doctrine Of The Strenuous Life; The Life Of Toil And Effort; Of Labour And Strife; To Preach That Highest Form Of Success Which Comes Not To The Man Who Desires Mere Easy Peace But To The Man Who Does Not Shrink From Danger, From Hardship, Or From Bitter Toil, And Who Out Of These Wins The Splendid Ultimate Triumph. A Life Of Ignoble Ease, A Life Of That Peace Which Springs Merely From Lack Either Of Desire Or Of Power To Strive After Great Things, Is As Little Worthy Of A Nation As Of An Individual.

I Think We Are Warranted In Contending That A Society Thus Constituted, And Which May Be Rendered So Admirable An Engine Of Improvement, Far From Meriting Reproach, Deserves Highly Of The Community.

We Americans Have Many Grave Problems To Solve, Many Threatening Evils To Fight, And Many Deeds To Do, If, As We Hope And Believe, We Have The Wisdom, The Strength, And The Courage And The Virtue To Do Them. But We Must Face Facts As They Are. We Must Neither Surrender Ourselves To A Foolish Optimism, Nor Succumb To A Timid And Ignoble Pessimism.

There Is Not In All America A More Dangerous Trait Than The Deification Of Mere Smartness Unaccompanied By Any Sense Of Moral Responsibility.

Believe You Can Do It And You Are Halfway There

There Is A Delight In The Hardy Life Of The Open. There Are No Words That Can Tell The Hidden Spirit Of The Wilderness, That Can Reveal Its Mystery, Its Melancholy And Its Charm. The Nation Behaves Well If It Treats The Natural Resources As Assets Which It Must Turn Over To The Next Generation Increased; And Not Impaired In Value. Conservation Means Development As Much As It Does Protection.

There Can Be No Effective Control Of Corporations While Their Political Activity Remains.

Nothing Is Gained By Debate On Non-debatable Subjects.

And To Lose The Chance To See Frigatebirds Soaring In Circles Above The Storm, Or A File Of Pelicans Winging Their Way Homeward Across The Crimson Afterglow Of The Sunset, Or A Myriad Terns Flashing In The Bright Light Of Midday As They Hover In A Shifting Maze Above The Beach -- Why, The Loss Is Like The Loss Of A Gallery Of The Masterpieces Of The Artists Of Old Time.

The Lack Of Power To Take Joy In Outdoor Nature Is As Real A Misfortune As The Lack Of Power To Take Joy In Books

I Have Always Said I Would Not Have Been President Had It Not Been For My Experience In North Dakota.

The First Duty Of An American Citizen, Then, Is That He Shall Work In Politics.

My Position As Regards The Monied Interests Can Be Put In A Few Words. In Every Civilized Society Property Rights Must Be Carefully Safeguarded; Ordinarily And In The Great Majority Of Cases, Human Rights And Property Rights Are Fundamentally And In The Long Run, Identical; But When It Clearly Appears That There Is A Real Conflict Between Them, Human Rights Must Have The Upper Hand; For Property Belongs To Man And Not Man To Property.

A People Without Children Would Face A Hopeless Future; A Country Without Trees Is Almost As Helpless; Forests Which Are So Used That They Cannot Renew Themselves Will Soon Vanish, And With Them All Their Benefits. A True Forest Is Not Merely A Storehouse Full Of Wood, But, As It Were, A Factory Of Wood And At The Same Time A Reservoir Of Water. When You Help To Preserve Our Forests Or Plant New Ones You Are Acting The Part Of Good Citizens.

The Biggest Corporation, Like The Humblest Private Citizen, Must Be Held To Strict Compliance With The Will Of The People As Expressed In The Fundamental Law.

Much Of The Discussion About Socialism And Individualism Is Entirely Pointless, Because Of Failure To Agree On Terminology.

After Nightfall The Face Of The Country Seems To Alter Marvelously, And The Clear Moonlight Only Intensifies The Change. The River Gleams Like Running Quicksilver, And The Moonbeams Play Over The Grassy Stretches Of The Plateaus...the Bad Lands Seem To Be Stranger And Wilder Than Ever, The Silvery Rays Turning The Country Into A Kind Of Grim Fairyland.

A Leader Is An Average, Everyday Person Who Is Highly Motivated.

In Every Community There Are Little Knots Of Fantastic Extremists Who Loudly Proclaim That They Are Striving For Righteousness, And Who, In Reality, Do Their Feeble Best For Unrighteousness. Just As The Upright Politician Should Hold In Peculiar Scorn The Man Who Makes The Name Of Politician A Reproach And A Shame, So The Genuine Reformer Should Realize That The Cause He Champions Is Especially Jeopardized By The Mock Reformer Who Does What He Can To Make Reform A Laughingstock Among Decent Men.

To Sit Home, Read One's Favorite Paper, And Scoff At The Misdeeds Of The Men Who Do Things Is Easy, But It Is Markedly Ineffective. It Is What Evil Men Count Upon The Good Men's Doing.

In The Grand Canyon, Arizona Has A Natural Wonder Which Is In Kind Absolutely Unparalleled Throughout The Rest Of The World.

Natural Wonders

There Can Be No Divided Allegiance Here. Any Man Who Says He Is An American, But Something Else Also, Isn't An American At All. We Have Room For But One Flag, The American Flag...we Have Room For But One Language Here, And That Is The English Language...and We Have Room For But One Sole Loyalty And That Is A Loyalty To The American People.

If An American Is To Amount To Anything He Must Rely Upon Himself, And Not Upon The State; He Must Take Pride In His Own Work, Instead Of Sitting Idle To Envy The Luck Of Others. He Must Face Life With Resolute Courage, Win Victory If He Can, And Accept Defeat If He Must, Without Seeking To Place On His Fellow Man A Responsibility Which Is Not Theirs.

There Are No Words That Can Tell The Hidden Spirit Of The Wilderness, That Can Reveal Its Mystery, Its Melancholy And Its Charm. There Is A Delight In The Hardy Life Of The Open... Apart From This, Yet Mingled With It, Is The Strong Attraction Of The Silent Places, Of The Large Tropic Moons, And The Splendor Of The New Stars; Where The Wanderer Sees The Awful Glory Of Sunrise And Sunset In The Wide Waste Spaces Of The Earth, Unworn Of Man, And Changed Only By The Slow Change Of The Ages Through Time Everlasting.

This Country Will Not Be A Good Place For Any Of Us To Live In Unless We Make It A Good Place For All Of Us To Live In.

The Great Virtue Of My Radicalism Lies In The Fact That I Am Perfectly Ready, If Necessary, To Be Radical On The Conservative Side.

There Comes A Time In The Life Of A Nation, As In The Life Of An Individual, When It Must Face Great Responsibilities, Whether It Will Or No. We Have Now Reached That Time. We Cannot Avoid Facing The Fact That We Occupy A New Place Among The People Of The World.

I Have A Perfect Horror Of Words That Are Not Backed Up By Deeds.

Far Better Is It To Dare Mighty Things, To Win Glorious Triumphs, Even Though Checkered By Failure... Than To Rank With Those Poor Spirits Who Neither Enjoy Nor Suffer Much, Because They Live In A Gray Twilight That Knows Not Victory Nor Defeat.

I Took The Canal Zone And Let Congress Debate; And While The Debate Goes On, The Canal Does Also.

In The First Place We Should Insist That If The Immigrant Who Comes Here In Good Faith Becomes An American And Assimilates Himself To Us, He Shall Be Treated On An Exact Equality With Everyone Else, For It Is An Outrage To Discriminate Against Any Such Man Because Of Creed, Or Birthplace, Or Origin. But This Is Predicated Upon The Man's Becoming In Very Fact An American, And Nothing But An American.

I Want To See You Shoot The Way You Shout.

There Is A Point, Of Course, Where A Man Must Take The Isolated Peak And Break With All His Associates For Clear Principle; But Until That Time Comes He Must Work, If He Would Be Of Use, With Men As They Are. As Long As The Good In Them Overbalances The Evil, Let Him Work With Them For The Best That Can Be Obtained.

The Sons Of All Of Us Will Pay In The Future If We Of The Present Do Not Do Justice In The Present.

In The Great Battle Of Life, No Brilliancy Of Intellect, No Perfection Of Bodily Development, Will Count When Weighed In The Balance Against The Assemblage Of Virtues, Active And Passive, Of Moral Qualities Which We Group Together Under The Name Of Character.

One Of Our Defects As A Nation Is A Tendency To Use What Have Been Called "weasel Words."

I Believe In Corporations. They Are Indispensable Instruments Of Our Modern Civilization. But I Believe They Should Be So Regulated That They Shall Act For The Interests Of The Community As A Whole.

Those Who Advocate Total Lack Of Regulation, Those Who Advocate Lawlessness In The Business World, Themselves Give The Strongest Impulse To What I Believe Would Be The Deadening Movement Toward Unadulterated State Socialism.

The Credit Belongs To The Man Who Is Actually In The Arena..who Errs, Who Comes Short Again And Again; But Who Does Actually Strive To Do The Deeds; Who Spends Himself In A Worthy Cause.

If There Is Any One Duty Which More Than Another We Owe It To Our Children And Our Children's Children To Perform At Once, It Is To Save The Forests Of This Country, For They Constitute The First And Most Important Element In The Conservation Of The Natural Resources Of This Country.

Laws Are Essential Emanations From The Self-poised Character Of God; They Radiate From The Sun To The Circling Edge Of Creation. Verily, The Mighty Lawgiver Hath Subjected Himself Unto Laws.

Every Thinking Man, When He Thinks, Realizes That The Teachings Of The Bible Are So Interwoven And Intertwined With Our Whole Civic And Social Life That It Would Be Literally, I Do Not Mean Figuratively, But Literally Impossible For Us To Figure What The Loss Would Be If These Teachings Were Removed. We Would Lose All The Standards By Which We Now Judge Both Public And Private Morals; All The Standards Toward Which We, With More Or Less Resolution, Strive To Raise Ourselves.

The Country Is The Place For Children, And If Not The Country, A City Small Enough So That One Can Get Out Into The Country.

Not Trying Is The Surest Way Of Achieving Nothing At All.

The Eighth Commandment Reads, "thou Shalt Not Steal." It Does Not Read, "thou Shalt Not Steal From The Rich Man." It Does Not Read, "thou Shalt Not Steal From The Poor Man." It Reads Simply And Plainly, "thou Shalt Not Steal."

The Armenian Massacre Was The Greatest Crime Of The War.

It Tires Me To Talk To Rich Men. You Expect A Man Of Millions, The Head Of A Great Industry, To Be A Man Worthhearing; But As A Rule They Don't Know Anything Outside Their Own Business.

A President Has A Great Chance; His Position Is Almost That Of A King And A Prime Minister Rolled Into One. Once He Has Left Office He Cannot Do Very Much; And He Is A Fool If He Fails To Realize It All And To Be Profoundly Thankful For Having Had The Great Chance.

To Hell With The Constitution When People Want Coal!

Nothing Could Be More Lonely And Nothing More Beautiful Than The View At Nightfall Across The Prairies To These Huge Hill Masses, When The Lengthening Shadows Had At Last Merged Into One And The Faint After-glow Of The Red Sunset Filled The West.

Success, The Real Success, Does Not Depend Upon The Position You Hold But Upon How You Carry Yourself In That Position.

If A Man Has A Very Decided Character, Has A Strongly Accentuated Career, It Is Normally The Case Of Course That He Makes Ardent Friends And Bitter Enemies.

Toward All Other Nations, Large And Small, Our Attitude Must Be One Of Cordial And Sincere Friendship. We Must Show Not Only In Our Words, But In Our Deeds, That We Are Earnestly Desirous Of Securing Their Good Will By Acting Toward Them In A Spirit Of Just And Generous Recognition Of All Their Rights.

The American People Abhor A Vacuum.

No Man Is Above The Law And No Man Is Below It: Nor Do We Ask Any Man's Permission When We Ask Him To Obey It.

Asking Permission

There Is A Delight In The Hardy Life Of The Open.

Most Of Us Tiptoe Through Life In Order To Make It Safely To Death.

Conservation Means Development As Much As It Does Protection.

Rhetoric Is A Poor Substitute For Action.

My Power Vanishes Into Thin Air The Instant That My Fellow Citizens, Who Are Straight And Honest, Cease To Believe That I Represent Them And Fight For What Is Straight And Honest. That Is All The Strength That I Have.

The Only Man Who Makes No Mistakes Is The Man Who Never Does Anything. Do Not Be Afraid To Make Mistakes Providing You Do Not Make The Same One Twice.

The Nation Behaves Well If It Treats The Natural Resources As Assets Which It Must Turn Over To The Next Generation Increased; And Not Impaired In Value.

I Wish To See The Bible Study As Much A Matter Of Course In The Secular Colleges As In The Seminary.

Life Is As If You Were Traveling A Ridge Crest. You Have The Gulf Of Inefficiency On One Side And The Gulf Of Wickedness On The Other, And It Helps Not To Have Avoided One Gulf If You Fall Into The Other.

We Fight In Honourable Fashion For The Good Of Mankind; Fearless Of The Future, Unheeding Of Our Individual Fates, With Unflinching Hearts And Undimmed Eyes; We Stand At Armageddon, And We Battle For The Lord

There Are Some Timid Souls That Will Never Know Victory Nor Defeat.

... Looked At From The Standpoint Of The Ultimate Result, There Was Little Real Difference To The Indian Whether The Land Was Taken By Treaty Or By War. ... No Treaty Could Be Satisfactory To The Whites, No Treaty Served The Needs Of Humanity And Civilization, Unless It Gave The Land To The Americans As Unreservedly As Any Successful War.

The Unforgivable Crime Is Soft Hitting. Do Not Hit At All If It Can Be Avoided; But Never Hit Softly.

The Bosses Of The Democratic Party And The Bosses Of The Republican Party Alike Have A Closer Grip Than Ever Before On The Party Machines In The States And In The Nation. This Crooked Control Of Both The Old Parties By The Beneficiaries Of Political And Business Privilege Renders It Hopeless To Expect Any Far-reaching And Fundamental Service From Either.

No Triumph Of Peace Is Quite So Great As The Supreme Triumphs Of War.

There Can Be Nothing In The World More Beautiful Than The Yosemite, The Groves Of The Giant Sequoias And Redwoods, The Canyon Of The Colorado, The Canyon Of The Yellowstone, The Three Tetons; And Our People Should See To It That They Are Preserved For Their Children And Their Children's Children Forever, With Their Majestic Beauty All Unmarred.

There Is Not A Man Of Us Who Does Not At Times Need A Helping Hand To Be Stretched Out To Him, And Then Shame Upon Him Who Will Not Stretch Out The Helping Hand To His Brother.

Now, It Is Very Necessary That We Should Not Flinch From Seeing What Is Vile And Debasing. There Is Filth On The Floor, And It Must Be Scraped Up With The Muck Rake; And There Are Times And Places Where This Service Is The Most Needed Of All The Services That Can Be Performed. But The Man Who Never Does Anything Else, Who Never Thinks Or Speaks Or Writes, Save Of His Feats With The Muck Rake, Speedily Becomes, Not A Help But One Of The Most Potent Forces For Evil.

The Six Great Gifts Of An Irish Girl Are Beauty, Soft Voice, Sweet Speech, Wisdom, Needlework, And Chastity.

It Is Necessary For The Welfare Of The Nation That Men's Lives Be Based On The Principles Of The Bible. No Man, Educated Or Uneducated, Can Afford To Be Ignorant Of The Bible.

To Borrow A Simile From The Football Field, We Believe That Men Must Play Fair, But That There Must Be No Shirking, And That The Success Can Only Come To The Player Who Hits The Line Hard.

A Healthy-minded Boy Should Feel Hearty Contempt For The Coward And Even More Hearty Indignation For The Boy Who Bullies Girls Or Small Boys, Or Tortures Animals.

If You Could Kick The Person In The Pants Responsible For Most Of Your Trouble, You Wouldn't Sit For A Month.

The Leader Works In The Open And The Boss In Covert. The Leader Leads, And The Boss Drives.

Outstanding Leaders

Our Chief Usefulness To Humanity Rests On Our Combining Power With High Purpose. Power Undirected By High Purpose Spells Calamity, And High Purpose By Itself Is Utterly Useless If The Power To Put It Into Effect Is Lacking.

No Greater Wrong Can Ever Be Done Than To Put A Good Man At The Mercy Of A Bad, While Telling Him Not To Defend Himself Or His Fellows; In No Way Can The Success Of Evil Be Made Surer Or Quicker.

The Greatest Historian Should Also Be A Great Moralist. It Is No Proof Of Impartiality To Treat Wickedness And Goodness On The Same Level.

The Greatest Privilege And Greatest Duty For Any Man Is To Be Happily Married, And No Other Form Of Success Or Service, For Either Man Or Woman, Can Be Wisely Accepted As A Substitute Or Alternative

I Do Not Care A Rap As To Who Gets Credit For The Work, Provided The Work Is Done.

What A Man Does For Himself, Dies With Him. What A Man Does For His Community Lives Long After He's Gone.

The Mother Is The One Supreme Asset Of National Life; She Is More Important By Far Than The Successful Statesman, Or Business Man, Or Artist, Or Scientist.

The Lives Of Truest Heroism Are Those In Which There Are No Great Deeds To Look Back Upon. It Is The Little Things Well Done That Go To Make Up A Truly Successful And Good Life.

We Have Room For But One Loyalty, Loyalty To The United States.

The Great Man Is Always The Man Of Mighty Effort.

There Are Two Things That I Want You To Make Up Your Minds To: First, That You Are Going To Have A Good Time As Long As You Live - I Have No Use For The Sour-faced Man - And Next, That You Are Going To Do Something Worthwhile, That You Are Going To Work Hard And Do The Things You Set Out To Do.

When She (my Mother) Passed Away, I Kind Of Understood The Commitment That She Made To Make Sure That I Could Stay In Skating. And I Wanted To Live Up To Whatever I Could. Not So Much Win Everything, But Just To Be The Best That I Could Possibly Be, To Honor Her Memory And Everything She Went Through To Make Sure That I Was Given The Opportunities To Be The Best That I Can Be. Not To Be A World Champion Or An Olympic Gold Medalist, But To Be The Best That I Could Be. And That Was The Most Important Thing That Ever Happened In My Career.

I Am Rather More Apt To Read Old Books Than New Ones.

In Any Moment Of Decision, The Best Thing You Can Do Is The Right Thing, The Next Best Thing Is The Wrong Thing, And The Worst Thing You Can Do Is Nothing.

Nowadays The Field Naturalist-who Is Usually At All Points Superior To The Mere Closet Naturalist-follows A Profession As Full Of Hazard And Interest As That Of The Explorer Or Of The Big-game Hunter In The Remote Wilderness.

I Believe That There Should Be A Very Much Heavier Progressive Tax On Very Large Incomes, A Tax Which Should Increase In A Very Marked Fashion For The Gigantic Incomes.

Conservation And Rural-life Policies Are Really Two Sides Of The Same Policy; And Down At The Bottom This Policy Rests Upon The Fundamental Law That Neither Man Nor Nation Can Prosper Unless, In Dealing With The Present, Thought Is Steadily Given For The Future.

There Are Rainy Days In Autumn And Stormy Days In Winter When The Rocking Chair In Front Of The Fire Simply Demands An Accompanying Book.

I Don't Think Any President Ever Enjoyed Himself More Than I Did. Moreover, I Don't Think Any Ex-president Ever Enjoyed Himself More.

The President Is That Invisible Force That Makes A School Of Fish Suddenly Change Direction, So That Everyone 'ohhs' And 'ahhs' At The Glimmering Mass And Only Later Wonders What Makes Them Move In That Way. I Read Somewhere-_harper's_, I'm Fairly Certain-that The Fish Are Only Avoiding Pockets Of Extra Cold Water.

We Do Not Admire A Man Of Timid Peace.

What I Am To Be, I Am Becoming.

It Behooves Every Man To Remember That The Work Of The Critic Is Of Altogether Secondary Importance, And That, In The End, Progress Is Accomplished By The Man Who Does Things.

Because We Are Unqualifiedly And Without Reservation Against Any System Of Denominational Schools, Maintained By The Adherents Of Any Creed With The Help Of State Aid, Therefore, We As Strenuously Insist That The Public Schools Shall Be Free From Sectarian Influences, And Above All, Free From Any Attitude Of Hostility To The Adherents Of Any Particular Creed.

Everyone Loves Justice In The Affairs Of Another.

We Cannot Do Great Deeds Unless We're Willing To Do The Small Things That Make Up The Sum Of Greatness.

Unless The Man Is Master Of His Soul All Other Kinds Of Mastery Amount To Little.

There Is Something To Be Said For Government By A Great Aristocracy Which Has Furnished Leaders To The Nation In Peace And War For Generations; Even A Democrat Like Myself Must Admit This. But There Is Absolutely Nothing To Be Said For Government By A Plutocracy, For Government By Men Very Powerful In Certain Lines And Gifted With The Money Touch, But With Ideals Which In Their Essence Are Merely Those Of So Many Glorified Pawnbrokers.

Society Has No Business To Permit Degenerates To Reproduce Their Kind

The Country's Honor Must Be Upheld At Home And Abroad.

I Hold That In This Country There Must Be Complete Severance Of Church And State; That Public Moneys Shall Not Be Used For The Purpose Of Advancing Any Particular Creed; And Therefore That The Public Schools Shall Be Nonsectarian And No Public Moneys Appropriated For Sectarian Schools.

Rattlesnakes Are Only Too Plentiful Everywhere; Along The River Bottoms, In The Broken, Hilly Ground, And On The Prairies And The Great Desert Wastes Alike...if It Can It Will Get Out Of The Way, And Only Coils Up In Its Attitude Of Defence When It Believes That It Is Actually Menaced.

Absence And Death Are The Same - Only That In Death There Is No Suffering.

World Suffering

The Name Roosevelt Has This Legendary Force In Our Country At This Time.

It Is Not The Critic Who Counts

Freedom From Effort In The Present Merely Means That There Has Been Effort Stored Up In The Past.

When You Play, Play Hard; When You Work, Don't Play At All.

A Thorough Knowledge Of The Bible Is Worth More Than A College Education.

We Do Not Admire The Man Of Timid Peace. We Admire The Man Who Embodies Victorious Effort; The Man Who Never Wrongs His Neighbor, Who Is Prompt To Help A Friend, But Who Has Those Virile Qualities Necessary To Win In The Stern Strife Of Actual Life.

No Man Is Above The Law, And No Man Is Below It.

This Country Has Nothing To Fear From The Crooked Man Who Fails. We Put Him In Jail. It Is The Crooked Man Who Succeeds Who Is A Threat To This Country.

There Is No Room In This Country For Hyphenated Americanism. When I Refer To Hyphenated Americans, I Do Not Refer To Naturalized Americans. Some Of The Very Best Americans I Have Ever Known Were Naturalized Americans, Americans Born Abroad. But A Hyphenated American Is Not An American At All.

Your Ability Needs Responsibility To Expose Its Possibilities. Do What You Can With What You Have Where You Are.

The Forces That Tend For Evil Are Great And Terrible, But The Forces Of Truth And Love And Courage And Honesty And Generosity And Sympathy Are Also Stronger Than Ever Before.

The Function Of Our Government Is To Insure To All Its Citizens, Now And Hereafter, Their Rights To Life, Liberty, And The Pursuit Of Happiness. If We Of This Generation Destroy The Resources From Which Our Children Would Otherwise Derive Their Livelihood, We Reduce The Capacity Of Our Land To Support A Population, And So Either Degrade The Standard Of Living Or Deprive The Coming Generations Of Their Fight To Life On This Continent.

Pursuit Of Happiness

Every Man, Who Parrots The Cry Of ‘stand By The President’ Without Adding The Proviso ‘so Far As He Serves The Republic’ Takes An Attitude As Essentially Unmanly As That Of Any Stuart Royalist Who Championed The Doctrine That The King Could Do No Wrong. No Self-respecting And Intelligent Free Man Could Take Such An Attitude.

Americanism Is A Question Of Principle, Of Idealism, Of Character. It Is Not A Matter Of Birthplace, Or Creed, Or Line Of Descent.

It Is Better To Be Faithful Than Famous.

I Can No More Explain Why I Like "natural History" Than Why I Like California Canned Peaches; Nor Why I Do Not Care For That Enormous Brand Of Natural History Which Deals With Invertebrates Any More Than Why I Do Not Care For Brandied Peaches. All I Can Say Is That Almost As Soon As I Began To Read At All I Began To Like To Read About The Natural History Of Beasts And Birds And The More Formidable Or Interesting Reptiles And Fishes.

Some Reformers May Urge That In The Ages Distant Future, Patriotism, Like The Habit Of Monogamous Marriage, Will Become A Needless And Obsolete Virtue; But Just At Present The Man Who Loves Other Countries As Much As He Does His Own Is Quite As Noxious A Member Of Society As The Man Who Loves Other Women As Much As He Loves His Wife. Love Of Country Is An Elemental Virtue, Like Love Of Home.

For Unflagging Interest And Enjoyment, A Household Of Children, If Things Go Reasonably Well, Certainly All Other Forms Of Success And Achievement Lose Their Importance By Comparison.

It Is Not The Critic Who Counts; Not The Man Who Points Out How The Strong Man Stumbles, Or Where The Doer Of Deeds Could Have Done Them Better. The Credit Belongs To The Man Who Is Actually In The Arena, Whose Face Is Marred By Dust And Sweat And Blood; Who Strives Valiantly; . . . Who At Best Knows In The End The Triumph Of High Achievement, And Who At Worst, If He Fails, At Least Fails While Daring Greatly.

In The Western Hemisphere The Adherence Of The United States To The Monroe Doctrine May Force The United States, However Reluctantly, In Flagrant Cases Of Such Wrong Doing Or Impotence, To The Exercise Of An International Police Power.

Don't Foul, Don't Flinch-hit The Line Hard.

Do Something Now. If Not You, Who? If Not Here, Where? If Not Now, When?

Abraham Lincoln - The Spirit Incarnate Of Those Who Won Victory In The Civil War - Was The True Representative Of This People, Not Only For His Own Generation, But For All Time, Because He Was A Man Among Men.

Women Should Have Free Access To Every Field Of Labor Which They Care To Enter, And When Their Work Is As Valuable As That Of A Man It Should Be Paid As Highly.

I Believe In A Graduated Income Tax On Big Fortunes, And In . . . A Graduated Inheritance Tax On Big Fortunes, . . . Increasing Rapidly In Amount With The Size Of The Estate.

Progressive Taxation

One Of Our Defects As A Nation Is A Tendency To Use What Have Been Called ''weasel Words.'' When A Weasel Sucks Eggs The Meat Is Sucked Out Of The Egg. If You Use A ''weasel Word'' After Another There Is Nothing Left Of The Other.

I Hate A Man Who Skins The Land.

To Announce That There Must Be No Criticism Of The President, Or That We Are To Stand By The President, Right Or Wrong, Is Not Only Unpatriotic And Servile, But Is Morally Treasonable To The American Public. Nothing But The Truth Should Be Spoken About Him Or Any One Else. But It Is Even More Important To Tell The Truth, Pleasant Or Unpleasant, About Him Than About Any One Else.

We Can Just As Little Afford To Follow The Doctrinaires Of An Extreme Individualism As The Doctrinaires Of An Extreme Socialism.

Much Of The Usefulness Of Any Career Must Lie In The Impress That It Makes Upon, And The Lessons That It Teaches To, The Generations That Come After.

Our Loyalty Is Due Entirely To The United States. It Is Due To The President Only And Exactly To The Degree In Which He Efficiently Serves The United States. It Is Our Duty To Support Him When He Serves The United States Well. It Is Our Duty To Oppose Him When He Serves It Badly. This Is True About Mr. Wilson Now And It Has Been True About All Our Presidents In The Past. It Is Our Duty At All Times To Tell The Truth About The President And About Every One Else, Save In The Cases Where To Tell The Truth At The Moment Would Benefit The Public Enemy.

If I Have To Choose Between Peace And Righteousness, I'll Choose Righteousness.

The United States Does Not Have A Choice As To Whether Or Not Is Will Or Will Not Play A Great Part In The World. Fate Has Made That Choice For Us. The Only Question Is Whether We Will Play The Part Well Or Badly.

Materially We Must Strive To Secure A Broader Economic Opportunity For All Men, So That Each Shall Have A Better Chance To Show The Stuff Of Which He Is Made.

I Want To See You Game, Boys, I Want To See You Brave And Manly, And I Also Want To See You Gentle And Tender.

Each One Must Do His Part If We Wish To Show That The Nation Is Worthy Of Its Good Fortune.

There Is No Room In This Country For Hyphenated Americanism. The One Absolutely Certain Way Of Bringing This Nation To Ruin, Of Preventing All Possibility Of Its Continuing To Be A Nation At All, Would Be To Permit It To Become A Tangle Of Squabbling Nationalities.

Let Us Live In The Harness, Striving Mightily.

I Was A Reasonably Good Student In College ... My Chief Interests Were Scientific. When I Entered College, I Was Devoted To Out-of-doors Natural History, And My Ambition Was To Be A Scientific Man Of The Audubon, Or Wilson, Or Baird, Or Coues Type-a Man Like Hart Merriam, Or Frank Chapman, Or Hornaday, To-day.

'liar' Is Just As Ugly A Word As 'thief,' Because It Implies The Presence Of Just As Ugly A Sin In One Case As In The Other. If A Man Lies Under Oath Or Procures The Lie Of Another Under Oath, If He Perjures Himself Or Suborns Perjury, He Is Guilty Under The Statute Law.

The Americans Of Other Blood Must Remember That The Man Who In Good Faith And Without Reservations Gives Up Another Country For This Must In Return Receive Exactly The Same Rights, Not Merely Legal, But Social And Spiritual, That Other Americans Proudly Possess. We Of The United States Belong To A New And Separate Nationality. We Are All Americans And Nothing Else, And Each, Without Regard To His Birthplace, Creed, Or National Origin, Is Entitled To Exactly The Same Rights As All Other Americans.

The Things That Will Destroy America Are Prosperity-at-any-price, Peace-at-any-price, Safety-first Instead Of Duty-first, The Love Of Soft Living, And The Get-rich-quick Theory Of Life.

We Stand At Armageddon And We Battle For The Lord.

I Have Had A Great Time As President.

Had A Great Time

Conservation Of Our Resources Is The Fundamental Question Before This Nation, And That Our First And Greatest Task Is To Set Our House In Order And Begin To Live Within Our Means.

The Constitution Was Made For The People And Not The People For The Constitution.

It's Not The Critic Who Counts.

I Believe That The Officers, And, Especially, The Directors, Of Corporations Should Be Held Personally Responsible When Any Corporation Breaks The Law.

All Constitutions, Those Of The States No Less Than That Of The Nation, Are Designed, And Must Be Interpreted And Administered So As To Fit Human Rights.

Our Flag Is A Proud Flag, And It Stands For Liberty And Civilization. Where It Has Once Floated, There Must Be No Return To Tyranny.

Nothing In The World Is Worth Having Or Worth Doing Unless It Means Effort, Pain, Difficulty… I Have Never In My Life Envied A Human Being Who Led An Easy Life. I Have Envied A Great Many People Who Led Difficult Lives And Led Them Well.

While The Nation That Has Dared To Be Great, That Has Had The Will And The Power To Change The Destiny Of The Ages, In The End Must Die, Yet No Less Surely The Nation That Has Played The Part Of The Weakling Must Also Die; And Whereas The Nation That Has Done Nothing Leaves Nothing Behind It, The Nation That Has Done A Great Work Really Continues, Though In Changed Form, To Live Forevermore.

The Fool Who Has Not Sense To Discriminate Between What Is Good And What Is Bad Is Well Nigh As Dangerous As The Man Who Does Discriminate And Yet Chooses The Bad.

We Are Consuming Our Forests Three Times Faster Than They Are Being Reproduced. Some Of The Richest Timber Lands Of This Continent Have Already Been Destroyed, And Not Replaced, And Other Vast Areas Are On The Verge Of Destruction. Yet Forests, Unlike Mines, Can Be So Handled As To Yield The Best Results Of Use, Without Exhaustion, Just Like Grain Fields.

There Is No Moral Difference Between Gambling At Cards Or In Lotteries Or On The Race Track And Gambling In The Stock Market. One Method Is Just Pernicious To The Body Politic As The Other Kind.

Give A Man A Soccer Ball, He Plays For A Moment. Teach A Man To Play Soccer, He Plays For A Life Time.

Short-sighted Men Who In Their Greed And Selfishness Will, If Permitted, Rob Our Country Of Half Its Charm By Their Reckless Extermination Of All Useful And Beautiful Wild Things.

Ours Is A Government Of Liberty By, Through, And Under The Law. A Great Democracy Must Be Progressive Or It Will Soon Cease To Be Great Or A Democracy.

Every Man Owes A Part Of His Time And Money To The Business Or Industry In Which He Is Engaged. No Man Has The Moral Right To Withhold His Support From An Organization That Is Striving To Improve Conditions Within His Sphere.

I Must Be Wanting To Be President. Every Young Man Does. But I Won't Let Myself Think Of It; I Must Not, Because If I Do, I Will Begin To Work For It; I'll Be Careful, Calculating, Cautious In Word And Act, And So - I'll Beat Myself.

The Great Lawyer Who Employs His Talent And His Learning In The Highly Emunerative Task Of Enabling A Very Wealthy Client To Override Or Circumvent The Law Is Doing All That In Him Lies To Encourage The Growth In The Country Of A Spirit Of Dumb Anger Against All Laws And Of Disbelief In Their Efficacy.

Rarely Has Any People Enjoyed Greater Prosperity Than We Are Now Enjoying. For This We Render Heartfelt And Solemn Thanks To The Giver Of Good; And We Seek To Praise Him -not By Words Only -but By Deeds, By The Way In Which We Do Our Duty To Ourselves And To Our Fellow Men.

Only Those Are Fit To Live Who Do Not Fear To Die And None Are Fit To Die Who Have Shrunk From The Joy Of Life And The Duty Of Life.

The American People Are Slow To Wrath, But When Their Wrath Is Once Kindled It Burns Like A Consuming Flame.

The Truth Is That Any Good Modern Rifle Is Good Enough. The Determining Factor Is The Man Behind The Gun.

The Reactionary Is Always Willing To Take A Progressive Attitude On Any Issue That Is Dead.

In Battle, The Only Bullets That Count Are Those That Hit.

It Is Difficult To Make Our Material Condition Better By The Best Law, But It Is Easy Enough To Ruin It By Bad Laws.

The Joy In Life Is His Who Has The Heart To Demand It.

There Are Always In Life Countless Tendencies For Good And For Evil, And Each Succeeding Generation Sees Some Of These Tendencies Strengthened And Some Weakened; Nor Is It By Any Means Always, Alas! That The Tendencies For Evil Are Weakened And Those For Good Strengthened. But During The Last Few Decades There Certainly Have Been Some Notable Changes For Good In Boy Life. The Great Growth In The Love Of Athletic Sports, For Instance, While Fraught With Danger If It Becomes One-sided And Unhealthy, Has Beyond All Question Had An Excellent Effect In Increased Manliness.

The Dreams Of Golden Glory In The Future Will Not Come True Unless, High Of Heart And Strong Of Hand, By Our Own Mighty Deeds We Make Them Come True.

Unjust War Is To Be Abhorred; But Woe To The Nation That Does Not Make Ready To Hold Its Own In Time Of Need Against All Who Would Harm It! And Woe Thrice Over To The Nation In Which The Average Man Loses The Fighting Edge, Loses The Power To Serve As A Soldier If The Day Of Need Should Arise!

No People Ever Yet Benefited By Riches If Their Prosperity Corrupted Their Virtue.

The Most Practical Kind Of Politics Is The Politics Of Decency.

There Is Quite Enough Sorrow And Shame And Suffering And Baseness In Real Life, And There Is No Need For Meeting It Unnecessarily In Fiction.

The Absence Of Effective State, And, Especially, National, Restraint Upon Unfair Money-getting Has Tended To Create A Small Class Of Enormously Wealthy And Economically Powerful Men, Whose Chief Object Is To Hold And Increase Their Power. The Prime Need Is To Change The Conditions Which Enable These Men To Accumulate Power Which Is Not For The General Welfare That They Should Hold Or Exercise. We Grudge No Man A Fortune Which Represents His Own Power And Sagacity, When Exercised With Entire Regard To The Welfare Of His Fellows.

When I Say I Believe In A Square Deal I Do Not Mean To Give Every Man The Best Hand. If The Cards Do Not Come To Any Man, Or If They Do Come, And He Has Not Got The Power To Play Them, That Is His Affair. All I Mean Is That There Shall Be No Crookedness In The Dealing.

Bodily Vigor Is Good, And Vigor Of Intellect Is Even Better, But Far Above Is Character.

I Do. That Is Character!

The Need For Collecting Large Campaign Funds Would Vanish If Congress Provided An Appropriation For The Proper And Legitimate Expenses Of Each Of The Great National Parties, An Appropriation Ample Enough To Meet The Necessity For Thorough Organization And Machinery, Which Requires A Large Expenditure Of Money. Then The Stipulation Should Be Made That No Party Receiving Campaign Funds From The Treasury Should Accept More Than A Fixed Amount From Any Individual Subscriber Or Donor; And The Necessary Publicity For Receipts And Expenditures Could Without Difficulty Be Provided.

Nothing Worth Having Comes Easy.

Difficult Times

The Extermination Of The Buffalo Has Been A Veritable Tragedy Of The Animal World.

Criticism Is Necessary And Useful; It Is Often Indispensable; But It Can Never Take The Place Of Action, Or Be Even A Poor Substitute For It. The Function Of The Mere Critic Is Of Very Subordinate Usefulness. It Is The Doer Of Deeds Who Actually Counts In The Battle For Life, And Not The Man Who Looks On And Says How The Fight Ought To Be Fought, Without Himself Sharing The Stress And The Danger.

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