Your TR Source
President Roosevelt complains about the lies being told about him in papers like the New York Times calling him “undecided and vacillating” regarding the railroad rate bill. He tells John A. Sleicher that the papers lie because “they make their bread and butter by so doing.”
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-02-25
After reading the Cosmopolitan, President Roosevelt would like to talk over things with Alfred Henry Lewis. Some of the articles “consist of nothing but a mixture of hysteria and mendacity,” and while there is truth in some of them, others suppress the truth and rely on sensationalism. Roosevelt believes that Lewis can mold public opinion and wants him to do so properly.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-02-17
President Roosevelt chastises G. O. Shields for directly quoting him in an article after Roosevelt explicitly told him not to. To make matters worse, Shields misquoted, added, eliminated, and made up things that Roosevelt said to mischaracterize some of his opinions on the preservation of wildlife.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-02-19
President Roosevelt tells Attorney General Moody that he does not believe there is a chance to take action in the courts against the counsel of the beef packers, who paid a reporter to disseminate false and misleading statements about the case. The only course of action is to publish United States Attorney Charles B. Morrison’s letter, which explains the situation, and the documents regarding the case.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-01-26
President Roosevelt asks Senator Aldrich to read the enclosed papers, paying special attention to the letter from Indian Affairs Commissioner Francis E. Leupp. Roosevelt stresses that any allegation implying a bargain has been made on his behalf by Father W. H. Ketcham is entirely false.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-01-21
President Roosevelt is sure that Lieutenant Governor Lake saw the preposterous article in the Hartford Times based on an alleged conversation with Lake claiming that Roosevelt is trying to control Connecticut and wanted Lake to be a congressman instead of E. Stevens Henry. Roosevelt knows Lake did not say anything of the sort but is concerned about potential trouble if “so gross an absurdity” is repeated. Therefore, he asks Lake to take conservative measures to convince people that the article is false. He feels the Harvard Overseers have “acted like fools about football.”
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-01-22
President Roosevelt has become aware of an article purportedly written by Poultney Bigelow which attacks the administration of affairs on the Panama Isthmus, both by the Isthmian Canal Commission and by Secretary of War Taft. He asks Taft if there is any basis for these charges.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-01-06
President Roosevelt assures Governor Cummins that he had not heard of the article in question until Cummins wrote him about it. Roosevelt does not pay attention to such things.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-01-02
President Roosevelt tells Secretary of State Root that he thinks the statement, translated from the Argentine Blue Book of 1905, is “monstrous.” Roosevelt states he never said anything about the racial superiority of Argentinians. He asks Root if they should take steps to officially contradict the statement.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1905-12-19
President Roosevelt affirms that the letter that Osborne Howes published, which was allegedly from Senator Lodge to the late Secretary of State John Hay, was “an impudent forgery.” Lodge’s answer to Howe regarding the correspondence is “true in every detail.” In each letter to Hay, Lodge qualified his promise of support for the fishing treaty by saying he would only support it if the treaty was satisfactory to Gloucester.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1905-12-20
President Roosevelt encloses a further report on the Rosebud lands, which he asks Frank Basil Tracy to return when he is finished with. So far, not a single accusation from William R. Lighton has proved true, and most have been conclusively proven false.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1905-12-08
President Roosevelt tells Walter Camp that his son Ted wrote to both him and his mother that he was not unfairly targeted in the football game against Yale, and that the game was clean. In a postscript, Roosevelt describes his role in organizing a meeting between graduates of Harvard, Yale, and Princeton.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1905-11-24
President Roosevelt refuses to make any public statement on Henry Melville Whitney and his associates.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1905-11-18
President Roosevelt refuses to grant another interview to Henry Melville Whitney, and says that in the letter requesting that interview Whitney once again misrepresented what he said. Whitney requested the interview to clear up alleged misrepresentations he had already made, but Roosevelt says that Whitney has used inaccurate language, misquoted him, and taken things he said out of context when he related a conversation they had nearly a year prior.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1905-11-18
President Roosevelt tells J. L. Underwood that he likes to hear from confederate veterans, but the incidents Underwood described concerning his mother Martha Bulloch Roosevelt and grandmother Martha Bulloch never happened. Roosevelt’s grandmother was “very infirm” during the Civil War and he does not believe she ever lived in Philadelphia.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1905-11-20
President Roosevelt tells William L. Pryor that Governor James Kimble Vardaman and Senator H. D. Money have willfully been misleading in recounting statements he made about lynching. He encloses for Pryor copies of his speeches and letters to prove his actual statements on the matter. Roosevelt says he always makes a point of denouncing the alleged crime that proceeded a lynching in speeches on the subject.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1905-11-13
President Roosevelt affirms his strong support for the Massachusetts Republican ticket, and advises Senator Lodge on how to respond to a statement from Henry Melville Whitney that misrepresents Roosevelt’s feelings on trade reciprocity with Canada. Roosevelt believes that it will do no good for him personally to make a statement, but approves of Lodge’s plan of publicly affirming Roosevelt’s support of the Republican ticket and stating that the Senators from Massachusetts have always agreed with him on reciprocity and that Roosevelt’s views on the matter have never changed.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1905-11-01
President Roosevelt commends W. A. Fraser for making it clear that his animal stories are fiction, rather than, as some naturalists do, present them as fact.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1905-10-12
President Roosevelt takes issue with an article by Clifford Howard which appeared in The Outlook. Howard wrongly asserts that there is dishonesty and corruption among government officials who use government funds and services for personal use. In a postscript, Roosevelt also encloses information about Dr. Louis Livingston Seaman. He does not believe that Seaman can be a supporter regarding the increase of medical force in the army, because “no one could afford to be responsible for his utterly reckless statements.”
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1905-10-14
Although President Roosevelt decided not to send the letter he enclosed yesterday for Lyman Abbott to George Kennan, he tells Abbott that he still takes issue with some of Kennan’s reporting on the Russo-Japanese War. Roosevelt likes Kennan, but points out that at various times he has made errors in his reporting.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1905-10-16