Theodore Rex - Edmund Morris [440]
92 Cortelyou’s friends Cortelyou’s difficulties, which are amply documented in GBC, arose out of the deaths of three investors in a preparatory school he founded and headed in 1887. When the venture failed, he refused insolvency and entered the Postal Service, determined to reimburse their estates. By 1905, he was clear of all debt.
93 Soon Democratic campaign Wheaton, “Genius and the Jurist,” 473–80.
94 All Cortelyou said Presidential scrapbook (TRP). “My determination to keep quiet,” Cortelyou wrote the President on 2 Oct. 1904, “has been largely with the hope of drawing their fire far enough ahead of the election” (TRP).
95 The fighter in TR to George Cortelyou, 2 Oct. 1904 (GBC); TR, Letters, vol. 3, 963. Perhaps coincidentally, he wrote a few days later to praise the hunter Stewart White’s prowess in killing “105 pigs in two weeks” with a knife. He doubted that he could pull off such a feat himself, although “I have a bully knife … with a fourteen-inch blade, and I firmly believe that one thrust would do the business … even against a boar.” TR, Letters, vol. 3, 978.
96 “Mr. Cortelyou is” Cornelius Bliss to TR, 3 Oct. 1904 (TRP). Another professional impressed by Cortelyou’s quiet, yet effortlessly thorough, performance was James S. Clarkson. “The red light is no longer a color in politics and the brass band has departed. Instead of trying to capture men in the mass, [his] system is to go to them in detail and reach them along the lines of effective influence.” Clarkson to Leigh Hunt, 1 Oct. 1904 (JSC).
97 After Elihu Root’s McCormick, From Realignment to Reform, 189; TR, Letters, vol. 4, 962.
98 The Democratic National James S. Clarkson to Leigh Hunt, 1 Oct. 1903 (JSC).
99 “Pray get out” McCormick, From Realignment to Reform, 191; TR, Letters, vol. 4, 961.
100 “The drift here” William D. Foulke to TR, 6 Oct. 1904 (TRP). TR had privately used the same metaphor himself. TR to George Cortelyou, 2 Oct. 1904 (GBC).
101 At 1 Madison Campaign Contributions, 685.
102 “Who is this?” Ibid., 685–86.
103 “I would rather” Long afterward, when this telephone conversation was put on the record, Scott hedged his memory of it, saying the President might have said, “Mr. Harriman is coming to see me.” Whoever made the first move, each man had cause to seek the interview.
104 Harriman was a Harriman had also served as a delegate to the Republican National Convention (Klein, Life and Legend of E. H. Harriman, 363). Wheaton, “Genius and the Jurist,” 494ff., suggests that Harriman’s new interest in politics was an extension of his business rivalry with J. P. Morgan. TR was aware of this rivalry, and encouraged it by sedulously consulting “now the one [man], now the other” (495).
105 “In view of” TR, Letters, vol. 4, 979.
106 “Now, my dear” Ibid., 983.
107 Harriman was thus TR, Letters, vol. 4, 983; vol. 5, 448. Klein, Life and Legend of E. H. Harriman, 364, notes that this addendum also served as “evidence” that if Harriman came south to see the President, it was on his own initiative. Eight years later, TR cited it to that exact purpose. See TR, Letters, vol. 7, 609.
108 When Harriman called John Hay diary, 15 Oct. 1903 (JH); TR, Letters, vol. 3, 985; vol. 5, 448.
109 Twelve thousand New York World and The New York Times, 20 Oct. 1904. According to a survey conducted by the Odell organization, TR could expect a 96,000-vote plurality in New York State, while Higgins was trailing his Democratic opponent. Wheaton, “Genius and the Jurist,” 498.
110 Roosevelt received E. H. Harriman to TR (telegram), 20 Oct. 1904; William Loeb to TR, 21 Sept. 1912 (TRP); EKR diary, 20 Oct. 1904 (TRC).
111 Roosevelt spent TR in Letters, vol. 7, 608; William Loeb in Campaign Contributions, 529; E. H. Harriman in ibid., 693; Benjamin B. Odell in ibid., 112. TR appears to have conveniently forgotten to raise the subject of railroad regulation. Another subject of great interest to Harriman that TR wished to avoid was Governor Odell’s desire to have Chauncey Depew appointed United States