The Wilderness Warrior - Douglas Brinkley [234]
II
Coinciding with his second annual address as governor of New York was Roosevelt’s publication of The Strenuous Life, his essays expounding his view of the hardy American character being replenished by the outdoors life. Overcrowded and unsanitary big cities, where the air was foul and pestilence was bred, where whole blocks were nothing more than slums, were incompatible with health. In speeches in New York City that month—one given at the Boone and Crockett Club’s annual banquet—Roosevelt stated that the time had arrived for wildlife preservation, clean rivers, antipollution laws, and wise use of forests. There was an intensity to Roosevelt during those opening months of 1900 that was almost electric. Writing to Henry L. Sprague, for example, Roosevelt mentioned for the first time that he was fond of the West African proverb “Speak softly and carry a big stick; you will go far.”16 To historians this proverb has become emblematic of Roosevelt’s imperialistic belief that the United States should maintain a robust army and navy while using diplomatic channels in foreign affairs, dangling the threat of war over adversaries’ heads. “Roosevelt loads his gun too heavy,” Burroughs wrote in his diary. “The recoil hurts him more than the shot does his enemy. He is bound to make a big noise but the kick of the gun is so much power taken from the force of the bullet. People react vigorously against him as they always do to his surplus verbal energy.”17
Like in foreign afairs, there was little soft speaking from Governor Roosevelt regarding forestry and wildlife protection; there was only the big stick. Such intimidation tactics on behalf of wildlife protection, particularly against the millinary industry, often worked. On February 10, for example, a few weeks after his second annual message, the state legislature revised Chapter 31 of the General Laws and approved Act (Ch 20) for the protection of forests, fish, and game. New York state now had the most progressive conservation protection laws in the United States (with the possible exception of Vermont). As the historian G. Wallace Chessman noted, Roosevelt squared off against the powerful Utica Electric Light Company when it tried to purchase private lands in the Adirondack Park; protecting birds, he said, came first.18 By March 1900 Roosevelt had also won approval for the land, funds, and management for Palisades Park, which he had deeply wanted. Largely because of Roosevelt’s opposition to quarrying, the ruination of the cliffs had stopped overnight. That success spurred Roosevelt onward. If New York and New Jersey could create a joint park at the Palisades, he didn’t see why Wisconsin and Michigan—to give just one example—couldn’t do the same with the islets surrounding Beaver Island in Lake Michigan. Meanwhile, Roosevelt began promoting Gifford Pinchot as “the best authority on forestry in the country.” When some people raised the objection that Pinchot was “too political” in his work at the Forest Division of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Roosevelt squawked. Blithe irresponsibility had guided America’s forest policy for far too long; Pinchot was the intellectual antidote. “Pinchot has no more to do with politics than the astronomers of the Harvard observatory have,” Roosevelt said in Pinchot’s defense. “All he is interested in is his forestry work.”19
As for the oyster beds of New York, Roosevelt was searching for their protector. Uncle Rob had been conducting all sorts of experiments in oyster farming at Lotus Lake, and his nephew was probably intrigued. Basically, Roosevelt wanted to recruit someone like Seth Green to come work as the “oyster protector” at the Fisheries, Game, and Forest Commission. Writing to the conservationist George McAneny, Roosevelt said, “The man appointed to this position should of course have some literary knowledge, some scholarly attainment, but he must know practically about oysters and be able to row and sail and handle himself on mud flats.”20 Connected to Roosevelt’s