The book is "The Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, and the Golden Age of Journalism" (commission earned).
December 21, 2025
Another snapshot from a presidential biography.
Texted, just now, from my son Chris, who reads presidential biographies:
Posts
60 comments:
Rooselvelt busted the trusts to restore balance.
History rhymes.
Re: 'Sitting on the lid'
Liberals are complaining that the Justice Department has left in the faces of the little girls being abused while blacking out the photos of the rich, powerful men abusing them. But the rich, powerful men are the real victims of this investigation.
Cartoonists had the label everything just in case you didn't get it.
Looks like a thinly veiled toilet joke. CC, JSM
"Secretary of WAR!"
Tuberculosis was rampant in 1905. I don't think we can understand the times attitude toward fat. Fat meant not fatally ill.
Presidents... "Sitting on a lid."
Are we back to talking about Biden again?
Roosevelt could have easily won reelection in 1908, but when he won in 1904 he said he wouldn't run again and he felt that he had to keep that promise. He'd come back in 1912 and run as a Progressive to defeat his hand-picked successor Taft. But I guess everybody knew that. Taft was stunned by Roosevelt's betrayal. He had more or less been following in TR's footsteps, but Teddy moved far to the left to justify his third party run.
"...official Washington considered Taft "acting president" and "the real head of all execu- "
Taft and Jill went up the hill... no.
AI: Jill Biden and William Howard Taft share a professional background in education and a connection through White House history:
yadi yadi yada
De facto president was never mentioned.
Teddy had too big of an ego to stay away from Power. Poor Taft, he never should've been picked in the first place. He would never have run and won on his own. A little like Ford.
How would you break up a trust standard was easy because of geography but they regrouped off shore one of teddys aides helped form aramco
One might argue about the long term impact of the fda and other institutions less so with the white fleet teddy was an assimilationist and an opponent of jim crow
But the likes of dubois didnt think he had moved far enough so he endorsed wilson (one of his many bouts of bad judgement
Progressivism was on balance a deoarture from the republic and you see where we find ourselvss
The increasingly large state the jntroduction of the income tax all helped to reduce earning power of the dollat
The phillipine incursion was one of the first real challenges to American power Nicaragua was next on the list
Was the urine deep enough to drown a young woman? Asking for a liberal friend.
A great power likely would have an intelligence service even mis sized ones but who watches the watchers as the romans say
Does it need a Central Bank we didnt for nearly a hundred years
Re "Golden age of journalism"
1) "Golden" means that it may look like gold to the untrained eye but it is definitely NOT actually gold. Golden is just a color.
2) Golden is a shade of yellow. As in "Yellow journalism"
3) Piss is also golden.
I would like some explanation of why the author, or anyone else, thinks that journalism has ever had a golden age. Mark Twain said, 140 years ago, "If I do not read a newspaper, I am uninformed. If I do read a newspaper, I am misinformed."
John Henry
The age of TR and Taft was also the age of yellow journalism. Pulitzer, Hearst, Scripps, Ochs, Chandler and others scrambling to find the yellowest, most salable, stories, true and or not and use them to sell papers.
In one sense they were honest and that was in their connections to political parties. you had the Podunk Democrat and the Bumfook Republican. In the 1950's the Chandler then running the LA Times said "The only way we will run an article favorable to a democrat is if they pay for it.
In this "Golden Age", the LA Times was primarily a vehicle to promote the Chandler family real estate interests.
Newspapers have been shit since the first broadsheets back in 1600 or so. I would say that they are less shit now than in the past.
Still shit, but 6' deep instead of 12'
Great book on newspapers is David Halberstam's 1979 book, "The Powers that Be". Someone here recommended it a couple years back and caused me to read it. Whoever you were, thank you.
John Henry
I disagree halberstam who has been getting things wrong since 1961 only looks down at rhe chandler times because it didnt push his agenda somewhat like the slander against mulholland in china town
Brain slugs are hard to remove
Perhaps its taken generations to unravel the black legend they pinned on nixon because he was not a talented lawfare player
Isn't Doris Kearns Goodwin somewhat of a yellow journalist herself?
John Henry
The hearst publication of which esquire is one is much worse thsn they were in the heyday that citizen kane cribbing from swanberg disparaged
Nixon's problem was that he sent Alger Hiss, deep stater extraordinaire, to prison.
That can NEVER be forgiven.
Ditto McCarthy for similar reasons. Though he only exposed deep staters, didn't send them to jail.
John Henry
That was the crux of it, everything else was ornament
Also the chandlers forgot what got them to their position
TR had the bully pulpit; Noem had the puppy bullet.
Interesting! This post prompted me to do research and learn a little history. I knew some of these facts, but not all. And I have a question at the end.
Teddy Roosevelt was vice president in 1901 when President William McKinley was assassinated. Roosevelt became president. The office of vice president remained vacant until March 4, 1905. In 1903, Roosevelt nominated William Howard Taft to be Secretary of War. At the time, Taft was Governor-General of the Philippines. Taft became Secretary of War on February 1, 1904. Roosevelt was re-elected president in November 1904. His running mate was Charles Fairbanks. The inauguration was on March 4, 1905.
My question: The cartoon is dated April 5, 1905. Fairbanks was officially installed as vice president by then. Why didn’t Roosevelt and “official Washington” consider Fairbanks to be in charge in Roosevelt’s absence from Washington?
I liked Goodwin’s "Team of Rivals" a lot, so I looked forward to "Bully Pulpit". So far it has been a major disappointment. The hagiography is so slavish and syrupy it makes me want pancakes. I’ll give it a couple more chapters.
TR was one of the most attractive personalities ever to be President. And his life was fascinating. If Clinton was one of the worst men ever to be POTUS, Teddy was one of the best.
But... he was the original "Invade the world, Invite the world" President. That's why he was McCain's favorite President. Thank God Teddy lost in 1912, one shudders to think what he would've done as President during WW 1. He wanted to jump into the war after the Lusitania sunk. And in 1917, he wanted everyone drafted, everyone to sacrifice, and everyone to go over to France and fight and force "those Huns" to surrender Unconditionally.
I'll give him this. TR wasn't a liar like FDR. He wouldn't have lied us into. But we might have gone to war in 1915 if he'd been in the oval office.
“ The cartoon is dated April 5, 1905. Fairbanks was officially installed as vice president by then. Why didn’t Roosevelt and “official Washington” consider Fairbanks to be in charge in Roosevelt’s absence from Washington?”
The book addresses this. The author writes “Little mention was made in the press of the sitting vice president, Charles A. Fairbanks, as the press focused all attention on Taft.”
Acquired panama from columbia im loath to think any other places he invaded. Again he wanted to assimilate the immigra ts not a crazy notion
“ I liked Goodwin’s "Team of Rivals".
The next slogan will be “Team of Retards.” Applicable to which party you hate.
Fat shaming? Teddy was probably the least-interested President when it came to molly-coddling the weak. Truth-telling was more his forte, and the public was mostly adoring as a consequence. Political Correctness would not have stood a chance.
Immigrants now the rival in 1904 alton parker wouldnt have been better
Fairbanks was a conservative from Indiana who disagreed with the TR. Later became VP for Hughes in 1916. Back then, VP was chosen by the convention, not top-down diktates by the Presidental nominee.
So, standard practice was to balance ticket geographically and policy wise. For the R's from 1860-1944, that meant a balanced ticket midwest married to Northeast.
Dewey broke the mold in 48 and chose warren from California. One reason he lost. Warren added zero to the ticket. He was a liberal R. So, liberal he didn't give a rip who won in 48.
Nixon, goofy as usual, chose Lodge from Massachutes and Agnew from Maryland. Living in the past, the thought people still cared about Geography in 1960 or 1968.
I still think that the funniest presidential story came from Dr Mike, I think his handle was, about Eisenhower eating so much celery, Mamie complaining about it and wanting him to stop, that during a surgery, doctors found his intestines loaded with it, then later reading that there was a belief at the time that the rigidity of celery would transfer to a certain male organ.
If you read TR's letters (8 volume set) you'll find that he was an Immigration hawk until the late 90s. After about 1896, immigration disappears as a concern in his private letters. It doesn't reappear until 1915 when he gets upset over the "Hyphenated-American" stance toward WW 1.
Incredibly, he was shocked that so many immigrants (Not just Germans, but Eastern European Jews and Scandis) didnt give a rip about "the mother country" or hate Germany.
When he died in Jan 1919, he was still preaching 100 percent americanism. But old habits die hard, and its possible he would've vetoed the 1924 Immigration act.
Maybe not its hard to assume that point,
He had been in the west then had moved to new york which had its share of immigrants as he advanced to police chief then governor and vp
TR wanted to jump into WW1, true. But he put his money where his mouth was. He begged to be sent to the front but Wilson would not be upstaged. All four of his sons went, and Quentin, the youngest, died. Back then, the leading families actually led. CC, JSM
Just like his grandson ted the 4th led at d day
'Ciso, slight correction: the TR at D-Day was the same one in WW1: President TR's oldest son, commonly called TR Jr in partial observance of the "numbers are for living men" rule, but actually the third of that name. He was old as crap in 1944, and shouldn't have been allowed in uniform. He died of a heart attack about a month later. CC, JSM
Theodore IV (totally violating the numbers rule, and confusing the crap out of us since he was the son of "TR Jr") was in WW2 but in the Pacific and the Navy. CC, JSM
I can't think of any currently leading families who enter the wars like the Roosevelts and their contemporaries did. The McCains? John IV may even still be in uniform. But should they count, since Senator McCain was the political exception in a line of apolitical admirals?
And that may be the key word: apolitical. It's much harder to bop in and out of the military as wars come up, and be a politician in between. Both lines of work have been professionalized. Even the reserve component route for politicians doesn't seem to be followed by the highest political achievers: our most prominent examples of this path are Lindsey and Walz.
Maybe other commenters will correct me, if this thread hasn't died out. CC, JSM
And his grandson served in vietnam although turned out to be a lefty
"All four of his sons went, and Quentin, the youngest, died. Back then, the leading families actually led. CC, JSM"
They not only went, the went again in WW II. TR Junior won the medal of honor for his heroism at Utah Beach. Archie was wounded in the pacific. Kermit tried to join the British Army, then after Pearl Harbor joined the US Army (after pulling strings) and went to Alaska. Of course at 50 and unfit he should have been rejected and ended unfortunately committed suicide.
They were noble family. But people can be brave and patriotic and still hold foolish views that make them an absolute menace when in power.
Its unfortunate that TR Junior lost his bid for the NY Governorship in 1924. It might have lead to his being POTUS. One of the people who helped defeat him was Eleanor who followed him around the state giving speeches.
Ocean: "One of the people who helped defeat him was Eleanor who followed him around the state giving speeches."
Yes, bizarre how the two branches of the family were at opposite political ends (I guess Eleanor belonged to one branch by birth, and the other by marriage, but certainly she did nothing to bring them together politically). Yet all TR's surviving boys rushed to join the dicked-up war started by their dicked-up cousin Franklin. CC, JSM
TR was Eleanor's uncle, but Franklin was third or fourth cousin to their branch.
Then again, TR wasn't following a family tradition--his father didn't volunteer for the military during the ACWABAWS.
This wasn't an open thread. I took out the off-topic material.
The famous Mission Inn in Riverside, California has a giant chair displayed in the lobby, the Taft Chair. As I recall it was made for him by a local craftsman when President Taft visited the SoCal town during his term.
As with many things of the era there is a connection to Hearst as well. Maybe our diverse commentariat knows what that link is to the Taft chair at the Mission Inn.
In the 70s, James Barber classified presidents based on whether they were active or passive and whether they liked the job of president or not. Taft was supposed to be a passive-positive president, which was strange because he didn't really like being president, but the idea was that he, like Harding, liked to be liked and wasn't grimly dutiful. Barber's system started to break down as he tried to find a pigeon-hole for later presidents, but classifying them may provide an interesting parlor game.
TR had to get along with the Irish, German, and German Jewish politicians in NYC. He wasn't keen on later immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe. Wilson wasn't either. TR had his racial views, but Wilson was a much colder and meaner man than the excitable Roosevelt.
There was an anecdote about someone in TR's time trying to prove how progressive he was bringing forward the fact that "I subscribe to seven magazines." Does "Golden Age" refer to quality or quantity. It's fascinating if New York had 25 daily newspapers in 1920 and a staggering 50 (counting all the foreign language papers), but quality wasn't better than it has been in more recent years. For the upscale, more intellectual magazines, a decline in seriousness and depth has been offset by the much wider range of topics discussed.
Thank you, Ann Althouse and RCOCEAN II. So, the answer to my question (see my comment/question at 1:22 PM on 12/21) is: The relationship between the president and vice president is much different today than it was in the early 1900s (and earlier). Today, the president chooses the vice president just as he or she chooses every member of his or her cabinet. But in olden times, while the president chose every member of his cabinet, he did not choose the vice president. The vice president was chosen for him by his party.
I think I like today’s system better. It fits better with unitary executive theory. I think we are all going to hear a lot more about unitary executive theory when the decision comes out in Trump v. Slaughter, which is possibly the most important U.S. Supreme Court case of this century to date. Thank you, Professor Althouse, for your several posts on this case.
Narr: “ TR wasn't following a family tradition”
That made me think of Hank Jr. But I did too many song lyrics over the weekend, so I leave that exercise to the reader.
“Ted why do ya drink?….” CC, JSM
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