Jacob A. Riis (1849–1914). Theodore Roosevelt, the Citizen. 1904.
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| and able, but without polish or special fitness; the other a college man, a graduate of how many foreign schools of learning I don’t know, a gentleman of travel, of refinement. He was the man for the position, which included much contact with the outer world,—so I judged, and so did others. Roosevelt had the deciding vote. We urged our man strongly upon him. He saw the force of our arguments, and yielded, but slowly and most reluctantly. His outspoken preference was for the janitor’s son, who had fought himself up to the point where he could compete. And he was right, after all. The other was a failure; he was over-educated. I was glad, for Roosevelt’s sake as well as for my own, when in after years the janitor’s son took his place and came to his own. |
| One incident, which I have told before, I cannot forbear setting down here again, for without it even this fragmentary record would be too incomplete. I mean his meeting with the labor men who were having constant trouble with the police over their strikes, their pickets, etc. They made me much too proud of them, both he and they, for me ever to forget that. Roosevelt saw that the trouble was |