Your TR Source
President Roosevelt writes to Philip A. Stanton to discuss a new California law that forbids Japanese children from going to school with white children. Roosevelt says this law would violate America’s treaty with Japan and the Federal government would challenge it in court. The rest of the telegram is missing.
1909-02-08
President Roosevelt informs Representative Knowland that he has received his telegram and that the appointment of Clarence S. Merrill as postmaster has already been made. The president promises to “take up the whole matter” with Knowland, the Senators, and the rest of the delegation.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-09-11
President Roosevelt informs Representative Knowland that he only removes a man from office upon charges. Roosevelt did not select Knowland’s first choice of appointment because many people objected to his appointment. While Roosevelt will not revisit the issue, he will discuss whether Clarence S. Merrill’s appointment as postmaster should be permanent. Roosevelt pays heed to political considerations but not at the expense of poor conduct of a potential appointment.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-09-11
President Roosevelt tells Representative Knowland that he intends to give Clarence S. Merrill a recess appointment as postmaster and will confer with the Senate when Congress convenes.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-09-10
President Roosevelt read the article in The Atlantic Monthly. He agrees with Brander Matthews on James Fenimore Cooper and found the situation on controlling the gamblers entertaining. The reaction to Francis J. Heney in California is the same as the reaction from Wall Street to Roosevelt’s enforcement of the laws.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-09-02
President Roosevelt agrees with Secretary of War Taft and has removed the reference to receivership from his speech. The “Philippine question” is the only point on which he remains uneasy. He details his thoughts and concerns about the United States’ continued relationship with the islands, including their strategic importance in the event of a conflict with Japan and the issue of granting autonomy.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-08-21
President Roosevelt enjoyed Senator Bourne’s letter and the quotations from his wife, Lillian Elizabeth Wyatt Bourne. He appreciates Bourne’s support of sending the fleet to the Pacific, which will happen regardless of the approval of Senator Eugene Hale.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-08-13
President Roosevelt was impressed with the account of a German military attaché in Japan that German Ambassador Sternburg recently sent him, especially in the assessment that racial tensions are driving relations in the Pacific. Roosevelt looks forward to seeing Sternburg and his wife this weekend.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-08-03
President Roosevelt praises Secretary of State Root’s recent lectures at Yale University, calling them “lofty essays.” In an extended postscript, Roosevelt says he is enclosing a letter from Japanese Ambassador Kentarō Kaneko, saying he likes Kaneko, but also calls him a “fox.” Roosevelt says the Japanese have reason to be offended over the treatment of Japanese immigrants in San Francisco, and asks what other legal measures can be taken to protect them. On the other hand, Roosevelt says that these problems do not give Japan the excuse to be thinking of war with the United States. Roosevelt does not believe the Japanese will attack American positions in the Pacific or Alaska, but “there is enough uncertainty” for the United States to be on its guard for war.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-07-26
President Roosevelt compliments Ambassador Reid’s handling of the international arbitration proposal regarding American fishing rights in Newfoundland. Roosevelt says his chief concern in foreign affairs is the potential hostility between the United States and Japan, either due to “mob leaders” and “yellow journals” in California, or to the lack of foresight in men like Maine Senator Eugene Hale with regard to funding the Navy. Roosevelt is surprised that anyone pays attention to recent negative comments in the news about him made by George Brinton McClellan Harvey.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-07-26
President Roosevelt sends Major General Bell’s report to Secretary of War Taft. Roosevelt compares the threat of Japan conquering California in a war to the possibility of losing the Philippines or Hawaii. Roosevelt will do his best to prevent any wrong being done to Japan. He will also keep the country in readiness should war break out, though he expects that having someone like Senator Eugene Hale as chairman of the Senate Committee on Naval Affairs may make that difficult.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-07-23
President Roosevelt thanks Pamona College President Gates for his letter and tells him he appreciates having similar letters from Californians. This is because he holds the interest of the state at heart and is trying to do his best in a “pretty difficult situation.”
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-01-19
President Roosevelt thinks that it is “a wicked thing” for the idea of adding about one Japanese child to every Californian school to jeopardize relations between the United States and Japan, whether or not the schools have the constitutional right to deny the children admittance. He also hopes that Japan will propose a reciprocal agreement in which American laborers will be kept out of Japan and vice versa.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-01-09
President Roosevelt thanks Arthur Hamilton Lee for sending Robert Louis Stevenson’s essays. He thinks Lee’s visit accomplished a good deal, and that Viscount James Bryce will do well. The British government has the same issue with Newfoundland that the United States has with California, in that the central government must work with smaller governments to manage foreign policy.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-01-05
President Roosevelt thanks Baron Kaneko for his letters. He is glad to learn the feelings of the Japanese people about his message. He does not have much power to influence the school boards in California, but is doing his best.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-01-01
President Roosevelt thanks General Otis for his telegram, and assures him that he is doing everything possible in “the matters affecting California.”
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-12-26
President Roosevelt thanks his sister-in-law Emily Tyler Carow for the book that Edith Kermit Carow Roosevelt got him on her behalf. The Roosevelts have had their “usual type of Christmas,” though with fewer toys as the children get older. Soon they will go to the Pine Knot cabin with friends. Roosevelt has much to worry him in his work, but the incidents “will all go downstream.”
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-12-26
President Roosevelt tells Spectator editor John St. Loe Strachey that he is embarrassed of the way that former Ambassador Bellamy Storer has behaved in the press as of late, but that he ultimately stands by all sentiments he gave in the letters that have been made public. The president muses on the details surrounding the recent controversy regarding the exclusion of Japanese children from San Francisco schools, as well as his proposed plan for the United States and Japan to keep their laborers out of one another’s countries.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-12-21
President Roosevelt would like Senator Perkins to recommend a Methodist from California to be appointed as an army chaplain.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1901-10-16
Anna Howard Shaw has heard about Theodore Roosevelt’s upcoming speech at Carnegie Hall on “The Conservation of Womanhood and Childhood” and hopes he discusses the women’s suffrage movement in light of the growing list of states where women have gained the right to vote.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-10-14