Hot Time in the Old Town - Edward Kohn [15]
Roosevelt and Bryan were more alike than either man would have admitted. While Roosevelt has been compared to his distant cousin Franklin Roosevelt and his fellow progressive Woodrow Wilson, he also shared characteristics with Bryan. Born less than eighteen months apart and with political careers seemingly shadowing each other, Bryan and Roosevelt shared much of the same political and moral world.
Yet their differences are so striking that it is tempting to see the two men as mirror opposites. Certainly they were fierce ideological opponents. With his call for free silver and his railing against eastern, urban interests, Bryan represented the country’s agrarian backbone. Roosevelt’s message, on the other hand, was born of his urban background, with an emphasis on good government, civil service reform, and the need for a level playing field in politics, business, and the law.
Their political views derived from their upbringings. Roosevelt was born in Manhattan to a wealthy family and entered politics at a young age, making his way from the state assembly to Washington as civil service commissioner before returning to New York. He would gain fame in the Spanish-American War and be elected New York governor before being placed on the Republican ticket in 1900. Bryan, on the other hand, came from a modest family background in rural Illinois. First practicing law, he became involved in the Nebraska Democratic Party before being elected to Congress. This was the only political office he held before becoming his party’s nominee in 1896. Bryan was deeply influenced by his Christian fundamentalism, which often made him seem more preacher than politician. While raised a Presbyterian and a churchgoer, Roosevelt did not ascribe to religion as closely as Bryan.
Yet there was always something of the preacher in Roosevelt, too. While Bryan may have made his career with the words “Thou shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold!” Roosevelt would rally his Progressive Party followers in 1912 by saying, “We stand at Armageddon, and we battle for the Lord!”
Both men had similar ideas about American superiority, Anglo-Saxon superiority, and the duties of citizenship. They were infused with a sense of self-righteousness, a sureness in their cause no matter what the consequences. Roosevelt had already shown this characteristic on a number of occasions by 1896, although his most notorious example would come when he split the Republican Party in 1912, handing the election to Democrat Woodrow Wilson.
By 1896 Bryan had helped split the Democrats with his stand for free silver against the position of Democratic president Grover Cleveland. This was not the last time he would embarrass a sitting Democratic president. In 1915, with the United States still neutral in the war in Europe, Bryan held the important position of secretary of state to Woodrow Wilson. After the sinking of the British passenger liner Lusitania killed 128 Americans, Wilson demanded that Germany pay reparations and disavow U-boat attacks on passenger ships. Bryan resigned in protest, fearing Wilson would trigger war. A secretary of state undermining his president’s foreign policy in a time of war was unheard of. Newspapers referred to Bryan’s “unspeakable treachery” and noted that “men have been shot and beheaded, even hanged, drawn and quartered for treason less heinous.” To such savage criticism, the fundamentalist Bryan might have replied, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God.”
Both Roosevelt