Theodore Roosevelt came to prominence for his progressive politics and his presidency in early twentieth century America. He was the possessor of an extraordinary life; he was at various times a law student, historian/writer, State Assemblyman, cowboy, civil servant, policeman, cabinet member, State Governor, soldier, naturalist, Vice President and, of course, President.

His presidency was characterized by “progressive” politics: opposition to large corporations, some support for labor organizations and generally attempting to gain more regulatory powers for the presidency. He won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1906 for his mediation between the Russians and Japanese following their war of 1905 and did not get involved in the imperial adventures – the Spanish-American war – in which he participated as a younger man. With the end of his two terms in office – his first term was without election as successor to the assassinated President McKinley – he sought to continue the implementation of his political philosophy with the grooming of Howard Taft as his presidential successor. But, as this later letter from Taft to the newspaper editor George Lorimer confirms, the relationship was one that did not last.

Once Taft was elected in 1908, he began to favour big business again and less state interference. This led to Roosevelt entering the race for the 1912 presidency and forming his own party, the Progressive or Bull Moose, to take on Taft. The newspaper editor Herman Henry Kohlsaat managed to get Taft to hand him the correspondence between the two presidential hopefuls. In this letter Taft claims that Kohlsaat never intended to publish the correspondence, but only wanted to use it to heal the breach between Roosevelt and Taft. However, ten years later, the letters came to the attention of George H. Lorimer, editor of the Saturday Evening Post, who did consider publishing them.

This letter was written three years after Roosevelt’s death and shows Taft’s wish to move on from the conflict: “I now cherish no ill will at all toward Theodore Roosevelt”. He does not wish those wounds to be reopened now, stating his prefernece “to leave to my children the discretion to publish what I may say to them, together with this correspondence, when the subject becomes ripe for the political history of the time.” It appears from this letter that his correspondence with Roosevelt was not to be published, even though it would paint him favourably in the light of the accusations he had faced. We see from this letter both the internal divisions that can afflict political movements and also the often cosy relationships that politicians once had with newspaper men.

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