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Photograph of the site where the Marquis de Morès built a meatpacking plant, located near the entrance to Theodore Roosevelt National Park in the town of Medora, North Dakota.
Theodore Roosevelt National Park
1966-04-28
President Roosevelt is sure that after reflection John A. Sleicher will come to the conclusion that William Jennings Bryan can be defeated by politicians other than Roosevelt. He thanks Sleicher for showing him the nice cartoon, and returns it as requested. Roosevelt clarifies to Sleicher that, regarding the matter of meat packers, he never quoted Upton Sinclair, and if the meat packers had been content to allow Congress to pass legislation quietly they would have avoided the negative publicity that has resulted.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-07-12
President Roosevelt does not understand what Bishop McDowell objects to in Secretary of Agriculture James Wilson’s statement of his attitude. The meat packing industry has behaved unwisely and has tried to prevent appropriate legislation, and Roosevelt believes that it is necessary for Wilson to make the packers understand that the government wants to see real improvement from them.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-07-11
President Roosevelt comments to Senator Proctor that he has not felt as strongly about the point that Proctor mentioned as the people championing the other side of the argument, and says that his “object is to be sure that the inspection is complete.” He presents several options for providing funding of governmental inspection of meat packinghouses, and believes that any of the methods would work. He does not want to keep seeming to interfere with Congress, and has been trying to keep out of its business.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-06-18
President Roosevelt acknowledges the statement he made which he was in error about there being no provision to make the meat packing plants accessible to inspectors at any hour, but comments that while a similar provision was put in, it was not as good as the original one. He explains his objections to further provisions of the bill, especially the one involving courts, which he believes shows “a deliberate purpose to interfere with effective administration,” as it would require a judge to back up any declarations of the Secretary of Agriculture. Roosevelt has spoken with Representative Henry Cullen Adams recently, who has agreed that the changes that Roosevelt and other members of the Executive Department recommended should be made. Roosevelt emphasizes to Representative Wadsworth that his aim is to allow “a thorough and rigid, and not a sham, inspection,” which the current amendment does not allow for.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-06-15
President Roosevelt was pleased to hear from John Nicholas Simpson, and assures him that he is doing his best to pass a bill related to the meat packing industry. Roosevelt fears that the opposition of the beef-packers will have a dampening effect on the livestock industry as their misdeeds are brought to light, but feels that if good legislation is passed the ultimate effect will be good.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-06-13
President Roosevelt forwards his son Kermit Roosevelt a note he received from Endicott Peabody which he believes shows that Kermit’s decision has raised him in his estimation. The situation with meat packers has been “perfectly crazy,” and has engendered a large amount of resistance from rich industrialists. Roosevelt comments that while the capitalists who first made big fortunes were disagreeable, they nevertheless had “tremendous energy and a great deal of cold clear-sightedness,” which is lacking from their descendants. The present Congress has achieved a great deal, and Roosevelt believes that it is one of the most productive he has had since becoming president.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-06-13
President Roosevelt explains that the only way to achieve the goal of assuring foreign nations that American meat is thoroughly inspected is to secure the passage of the Beveridge amendment, or one containing similar provisions. Any loss of trade rests on the shoulders of the people who have violated the law, and Roosevelt considers it imperative that legislation be passed to correct this both for the health of the United States’ own citizens and for the health of foreign trade.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-06-07
President Roosevelt sends Congressman Wadsworth the reports of an inspection made by a committee appointed by the Department of Agriculture into conditions at meat packinghouses. Prior to the completion of these inspections, Roosevelt ordered a similar investigation be made by Commissioner of Labor Charles Patrick Neill and James Bronson Reynolds. Their report is not yet concluded and contains some details not touched upon by the Department of Agriculture’s reports, but there is no significant disagreement in the two studies. Roosevelt believes that the simple fact of investigations into conditions at the packinghouses has already produced beneficial changes, and provides the text of a letter attesting to this. In order to continue this improvement of conditions, Roosevelt calls for “immediate, thoroughgoing and radical enlargement of the powers of the Government in inspecting all meats which enter into interstate and foreign commerce.”
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-06-08
President Roosevelt believes the telegrams that Senator Burkett sent him could all have been prepared by the same person, as they all contain very similar messages asking Secretary of Agriculture James Wilson and the Bureau of Animal Industry to announce that “government inspection is thorough and covers domestic and foreign meats.” To do this immediately, Roosevelt says, would be lying, and the only way to comply with these requests is to enact a rigorous law allowing such an announcement to be made.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-06-08
Thomas G. Lee instructs John J. Conron, both of Armour and Company meat packers, to charge $1.00 to $1.50 per pound plus margin for all beef sold in several East Coast cities the following week. Lee knows for sure that the other major meat packers have very little inventory, and consumers will have to pay the steep price or go hungry.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-11-01
John A. Sleicher writes President Roosevelt about Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle. Sleicher thought it did not represent what he saw when he toured the plant with the owner.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-07-11
Arthur J. Giles sends Ambassador Reid a copy of a resolution from the British Federation of Grocers that thanks Roosevelt and Reid for assuring the Federation that the American government guarantees the safety of American packed meat.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-07-10
The Grocers’ Federation of the United Kingdom issues a resolution in support of President Roosevelt’s actions in seeking to legislate better inspection of preserved provisions. Unless the Federation receives an assurance that future preserved provisions from the United States will be issued with a government certificate attesting to their soundness, it will recommend that trade in these goods should cease until such assurances are received.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-07-02
The Times-Dispatch reports on the need for governmental inspection of meat and meat packing plants. While previously companies boasted about their quality control, the publication of Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle and governmental investigations ordered by President Roosevelt have shown the truth to this falsehood. Such revelations have hurt the ability of American meat to be sold on the world market, thereby necessitating legislation allowing for government inspection.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-05-31
Secretary of Agriculture Wilson regrets that information about the department’s investigation of beef packers in Chicago seems to have been leaked to the press. Wilson assures President Roosevelt that he will ascertain whether any of his employees had anything to do with it, although he also notes that the Chicago Tribune article contains errors and large portions of it may have been based on guess work.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-04-11
Commissioner of Corporations Garfield writes to President Roosevelt about investigations he conducted of the meat-packing and petroleum industries. Garfield discusses the positive negotiation process with Standard Oil branches in Kansas. Garfield also discusses the difficulties of working with the meat-packing industry and with cattle raisers.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1905-04-22
Louis B. Livingston chronicles the relationship between Theodore Roosevelt and the Marquis de Mores during their time together as cattle ranchers in the Dakota Badlands. Livingston focuses on the controversy as to whether the two seriously contemplated a duel to settle their differences, and he charts their divergent paths once they left the West after the ruin of their ranches. Livingston details de Mores’s obsession with antisemitism which he argues helped precipitate the notorious Dreyfus Affair in France, and he documents Roosevelt’s outspoken opposition to antisemitism during his political career.
Six photographs supplement the article, including two of de Mores and three of Roosevelt during their ranching years. A text box with the mission statement of the Theodore Roosevelt Association appears at the end of the article.
Discussions in Congress regarding President Roosevelt’s proposed legislation allowing for oversight of the meat packing industry have gone in the president’s favor, and represent a political victory.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-06-19
Photograph of the chimney and other remnants of the meat packing plant operated by the Marquis de Morès in Medora, North Dakota.
Theodore Roosevelt National Park
1939-1941