Jacob A. Riis (1849–1914). Theodore Roosevelt, the Citizen. 1904.
Page 158
| had gone to sharpen the tools of war. War he knew must come. They all knew it; it was his business to prepare for it, since the first and hardest blows must be struck on the sea. |
| Here let me stop a moment to analyze his attitude toward this war that was looming on the horizon even before he left Mulberry Street. It was perfectly simple, as simple as anything he ever did or said, to any one who had ever taken the trouble to “think him out.” I had followed him to Washington to watch events for my paper, and there joined the “war party,” as President McKinley called Roosevelt and Leonard Wood, poking fun at them in his quiet way. There was not a trace of self-seeking or of jingoism in Roosevelt’s attitude, unless you identify jingoism with the stalwart Americanism that made him write these words the year before: |
| “Every true Patriot, every man of statesmanlike habit, should look forward to the time when not a single European power shall hold a foot of American soil.” Not, he added, that it was necessary to question the title of foreign powers to present holdings; but “it certainly will become necessary if the timid and selfish |