Author: cbanaszak@riponsociety.org

“While I am President I wish the labor man to feel that he has the same right of access to me that the capitalist has; that the doors swing open as easily to the wage-worker as to the head of a big corporation—and no easier.” Letter to a Critic November 26, 1903

Our prime need as a nation is that every American should understand and work with his fellow-citizens, getting into touch with them, so that by actual contact he may learn that fundamentally he and they have the same interests, needs, and aspirations. Chicago Labor Day Picnic 1900

“I believe in realizable ideals and in realizing them, in preaching what can be practiced and then in practicing it.” An Autobiography, 1913

“The first requisite of statesmanship is honesty. ” Letter to Mrs. Nicholson July 18, 1916

“Any effort is to be welcomed that brings people closer together, so as to secure a better understanding among those whose walks of life are in ordinary circumstances far apart.” Social Settlement speech 1902

“…and I ask two things in connection with our foreign policy – that we never wrong the weak and that we never flinch from the strong.” Address in Portland, Oregon May 21, 1903

“A nation’s greatness lies in its possibility of achievement in the present, and nothing helps it more than the consciousness of achievement in the past.” American Ideals 1897

A strong and wise people will study its own failures no less than its triumphs, for there is wisdom to be learned from the study of both, of the mistake as well as of the success. Sixth Annual Address to Congress December 6, 1906

“Your history, rightly studied, will teach us the time worn truth that in war as in peace we need chiefly the everyday commonplace virtues, and above all an unflagging sense of duty.” Address in Burlington, Vermont September 5, 1901