“Societies that cultivate patriotism in the present by keeping alive the memory of what we owe to the patriotism of the past, fill an indispensable function in this Republic.”

Speech in Washington, D.C.
May 2, 1902

“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

“Remember that the whole is the sum of the parts. It is a very good thing to come out to Fourth of July celebrations and hear what a great country we have.”

Address at Oyster Bay
July 4, 1906

“Don’t hit a man at all if you can avoid it, but if you have to hit him, knock him out.”

Speech in Cleveland, Ohio
November 2, 1916