President Roosevelt as a “Rough Rider” carries a pike labeled “Fearlessness” and rides an elephant labeled “Administration.” He has chased many men labeled “Dishonest Official” and “Corruption” from the “Post Office” Department. There are mail bags labeled “Corruption, Scandal, [and] Bribery” and letters labeled “Bribe, Scandal, [and] Bribery” flying in the rush of wind as corrupt officials flee Roosevelt and the rampaging elephant.
comments and context
Comments and Context
When Theodore Roosevelt became president, there were few Americans in or out of his Republican Party, or the nation as a whole, who thought that he would mend his ways as a reformer. Reform was an aspect of every position he held, from the New York Assembly, to party councils beginning with the 1884 presidential convention, to “civilizing” efforts in the Western prairies, to the national Civil Service Commission, to the New York City Police Department, to the Department of the Navy and the War Department around the Spanish-American War, to the Governor’s office in Albany. The Republican Old Guard famous feared his approach to the presidency in the case of William McKinley’s death (“Don’t you realize,” cried Senator Mark Hanna, “there’s only one bullet between that madman and the president of the United States?”) — and scarcely were assured when McKinley was assassinated, by Roosevelt’s promise to “continue, absolutely unbroken, the policies of the [McKinley] administration.
