- Joined
- Dec 1, 2020
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By 1961...
TR was already castigated as a socialist by Republicans in his own era, scorned as a "wild-eyed revolutionist" by the bankers on Wall Street, and dubbed a traitor to his class by the railroad tycoon E.H Harriman. That's what happens when you get into office and order the Department of Justice to launch over three dozen anti-trust lawsuits that break up monopolies controlled by the likes of J.P. Morgan and John D. Rockefeller; when you enact the first consumer protection and campaign finance laws in American history; when you flip federal policy on its head from land disposal to retention, from wanton exploitation of natural resources to conservationist stewardship, from private control to public ownership.
When you double the number of national parks, declare the first 18 national monuments, create the first 55 national wildlife refuges, establish and/or enlarge 150 national forests in the form of over 230 million acres (!!!) as a gift to the American people. We still have them today. He received hundreds of thousands of letters from ordinary US citizens pleading him to protect their favorite landscapes. And that's only half the story: TR was the founder of the world's first conservation organization (Boone and Crockett Club) in 1887, nearly 15 years before he even became POTUS. It was the driving force working behind the scenes to establish the laws and federal statutes giving the President unilateral power to declare forest reserves and national monuments; that established legal definitions for what a national park is and provided for their law enforcement; that brought an end to the commercial market hunting decimating wildlife to the brink of extinction.
His father had been a major backer for the northern cause in the Civil War and charter member of the Union League Club, bankrolled multiple hospitals and children's aid societies across New York, was a principal co-founder and director for two of the world's most venerable cultural institutions: the Metropolitan Museum of Art and American Museum of Natural History. The charter for AMNH was literally signed inside TR's childhood home. For all the talk about corporate and political elites, the wars they start and sacrifices they don't have to make: Who do people figure is the only President in U.S. history to have a son (Quentin) killed in combat? Yup. The other three also all served, in both World Wars. One of them (Ted) was the oldest man and only general to take part in the first wave on D-Day (TR's grandson was there too). Another (Archie) had his knee blown out in World War I, only to re-enlist for World War II and take another grenade to his legs. Kermit -- who had accompanied him on major scientific expeditions to East Africa and Brazil (@LeonardoBjj) for the Smithsonian and AMNH -- committed suicide on a US Army base in 1943.
True Story. Talk about contributions, service, and sacrifice. It's genuinely fucking mind-boggling. All that to say if this man and his family don't constitute the greatest credit to the history of our nation, they are god damn close. When @Takes Two To Tango invariably starts up a poll later this year on the Greatest Americans of All-Time as 250 approaches, somebody please @ tag me to go to War.
Speak*
