Theodore Roosevelt

     THEODORE ROOSEVELT, the twenty-sixth President of the United States, was born in the city of New York, October 27, 1858. His ancestors on the paternal side were of an old Dutch family, and on the maternal side, of Scotch-Irish descent. His early education was received under private tuition. He was graduated from Harvard College in 1880, and spent the following year in study and travel. From 1882 to 1884 he was a member of the Assembly of the State of New York as an independent Republican, and gained a wide reputation for his work for political reform, particularly in the field of the civil service. In 1884 he was chairman of the New York delegation to the National Republican Convention, and two years later was an unsuccessful candidate as an independent Republican for the office of Mayor of New York. He was made a member of the National Civil Service Commission by President Harrison in 1889, and served as president of the board until May, 1895, when he resigned to become president of the board of Police Commissioners of the city of New York. In 1897 he was made Assistant Secretary of the Navy by President McKinley, but on the breaking out of the Spanish-American War, in 1898, he resigned and organized the First United States Volunteer Regiment of Cavalry, popularly known as the “Rough Riders,” of which he was made lieutenant-colonel. He was attached to the army of General Shafter, for the invasion of Cuba, and participated in every engagement preceding the fall of Santiago. He won distinction at the Battle of San Juan Hill, on July 1, 1898, and was promoted to the rank of colonel on July 11, for conspicuous bravery in action. He received the nomination for governor of New York on the Republican ticket, September 27, 1898, and was elected by a large plurality. At the Republican National Convention held in Philadelphia, in June, 1900, he was nominated for Vice-President of the United States, William McKinley being the candidate for President, and was elected. The shooting of President McKinley on September 6, 1901, proved fatal on September 14 following, and Roosevelt took the oath of President at Buffalo, N. Y., on that day. He was elected in 1904 to fill the President’s chair again, but in 1908 refused again to be a candidate, successfully urging that William H. Taft receive the Republican nomination. After a hunting trip in Africa and a triumphal progress through Europe at its conclusion, he returned to the United States only to break with President Taft, on the ground that the latter was failing to carry out the Rooseveltian policies. In 1912, Roosevelt attempted again to gain the Republican nomination for President, but in spite of the great popular support afforded him in his campaign was rejected by the national Republican convention. Claiming [6637][6638] that he had been deprived of the nomination by fraud, he seceded from the Republican Party and formed the Progressive Party to contest the election of 1912. Although defeated by Wilson, the Democratic nominee, Roosevelt ran second, gaining more popular and electoral votes than the regular Republican nominee, Taft. With the outbreak of the World War, Roosevelt soon took a strong anti-German position, bitterly criticizing the Wilson administration for delay in calling Germany to account. He became active in the movements for preparedness and universal military training. After the United States entered the war, he tried unsuccessfully to be given command of a volunteer regiment in France. He died suddenly at his home at Oyster Bay, New York, on January 6, 1919.