THEODORE ROOSEVELT
17) I SEE DYNAMITE

President Roosevelt was nervous about the coming 1904 election because he had gotten the job when William McKinley had been murdered, and no  President-by-succession had ever won election on his own..

"In December of 1901  TR had showed the nation he was no McKinley when he wrote to Congress about the  ' "grave evils" ' of corporate monopolies. He  knew that ' "Americans resented eastern bankers and corporate trusts whose dictates on railroad rates and routs could destroy towns  and farms." ' Ohio Senator Hanna, who never wanted TR as McKinley's running mate  was stung when he found out Roosevelt had sued to break up Northern Securities. Hearing the shocking news, J. P. Morgan's son Pierpont Morgan bought shares in his own gigantic trust to avert financial panic.  see trusts     Excerpt from-Wealth Against Commonwealth,1894     

Roosevelt wrote a friend that "...his ' "chief fight" ' as President was against the new plutocracy, ' "as unattractive now as in the days of Carthage."

"Like both Adams and Andrew Jackson, he was taking a large risk by challenging the citadels of wealth and power,"

  Roosevelt face a pro business court system as demonstrated in 1877 with  Munn vs. Illinois which was a labor victory that would be overturned by  the Supreme Court. Consumers were also hurt by court decisions. See Pacific Railway Co. vs. Illinois

"... in the fall of 1902, he tried to stop the coal strike  that threatened, more than any event since the Civil War, to divide the country." For months, over 100,000 Pennsylvanian miners had been striking. There was sabotage, riots and murder. The leader of the United Mines Workers suggested a Presidential commission but railroad man George Bear refused to bargain with ' " instigators of violence and crime." ' 

Fearing ' "... the most terrible riots the country had ever seen..." ' Roosevelt got seventy-two year old ex--Commanding General of the U.S. Army John Schofield, to agree to, if necessary,  to seize the mines using ten thousand troops. Roosevelt was please that the General, his outdated skullcap and whiskers, did not look like a ' " military dictator" '.

Using the threat of  troops to nationalize the coal industry, TR got J.P. Morgan, still fending off the National Securities suit, to use his influence to have a commission resolve the differences.

Roosevelt knew he might be braking the Constitution by seizing property without due process of law but he felt that ' :"The Constitution was made for the people, and not the people for the Constitution." ' See Pullman Strike of 1894

Liking T.R.'s dexterity, the Republicans did well in the 1902 midterm elections. Roosevelt had the morals of a ' "green-grocer" ' and he felt easy divorces were "...were dragging the country into the ' "barnyard." '

Roosevelt felt he had amended capitalism to save it . "Better to take it from him than ' "some Bryan" ' who would ' " ride over them roughshod." '

Secretary of State John Hay gave a ring belonging to Lincoln to the new President as an inauguration gift. It was said to contain one of Lincoln's hairs and  TR said it would remind him ' " to put human rights above property rights." '

..."T.R. lauded the "man in the arena," who if he failed, at least did so "by daring greatly." ' 

One of FDR's sons told the author of this book that ' "My father spent his whole adult life competing with T.R.." '

In September of 1939, after Britain declared war against Hitler, FDR began secret corresponding with Winston Churchill the new First Lord of the Britain
Navy. This raised the suspicions of U.S. Ambassador

Tyler Kent, a clerk in Kennedy's operation, discovered the secret messages between the two leaders and convinced they were dragging the U.S. into the war on behalf of the Communists and Jews, he planned to make the messages public right before the FDR's reelection. His apartment was raided by Scotland Yard. They found many documents including that morning message from Churchill to Roosevelt. Kent's Jewish mistress in the bedroom. Kent was tried in London where the matter of their communication could be kept quiet under the Officials Secrets Act.

Roosevelt was pondering what to do about a Supreme Court ruling that had stopped the FBI from wireless wiretapping.  J. Hoover argued that such an action would stop the FBI from listening to Nazi plans to blow up the Queen Mary and other such dangers.  President  Roosevelt was interested other information like what the Nazi's knew of Kent's information. Roosevelt signed the secret orders giving Hoover blanket authority " ' to secure information by listening  devices" '. Attorney General Robert Jackson thought the order was illegal but he did not resign. He later wrote that Roosevelt usually acted in terms of ' "right and wrong" ' not ' " legal and illegal." '

' "By the end of his second term FDR's Hyde Park branch of the Roosevelt's was no longer on speaking terms with those from Oyster Bay." ' Theodore Roosevelt, Jr. had wanted to follow his father to the Presidency.  He and his sister Alice Longworth were members of the isolationist lobby and not happy with President Roosevelt.

FDR defeated Republican Wendell Willkie who was estranged from his Indian wife Billie and living with New York Tribune book editor Irita Bradford Van Doren. Billie agreed to campaign foe Wendell and share his hotel room. Asked about it she said, '" Politics makes strange bedfellows." ' 

Getting lend lease of fifty destroyers for Britain through Congress was proving difficult so FDR asked Attorney General Robert Jackson if he could just do it and again Jackson said OK to a difficult issue. It was announced on September 3, 1940. Willkie said it was dictatorial and FDR said Jefferson didn't ask Congress when he made the Louisiana purchase. By the end of September Japan had joined Hitler and Mussolini.  Pictured here President Roosevelt signs the Lend-Lease bill to give aid to Britain and China (1941)

Hitler's chief diplomat was funneling money to isolationists on Capital Hill.  Roosevelt had a recorder installed in the Oval Office hoping to stop Trying to stop leaks like the false claim he would defend Europe form Germany. The recorder was playing when Roosevelt was slinging mud about Willkie's affair with Van Doren.

By October the expected Republican surge came as Hitler was stalled and Willkey was gaining because of Republican charges that Roosevelt was making secret deals to get America into the war. Powerful union leader John L. Lewis used radio to tell America that  Roosevelt was scheming and would make "cannon fodder" out of their sons.

Joe Kennedy's family returned to America as German bombs were hitting London, and Kennedy..." was ready to put "twenty-five million Catholics votes behind Willkie ..."

Obsessed with leaving each of his nine children with millions of dollars, he felt his small capitalistic class was safer under Hitler than under Churchill or the communists.

Kennedy was an Intimate and close friend of writer/politician Clare Boothe Luce. In a letter before his planned radio Presidential campaign endorsement of one of the candidates, she begged Kennedy not to indorse Roosevelt as she was "terribly frightened for this country..." 

Gallop polls in 1940 revealed that Americans felt the most pressing problem facing the country by far(47%) was staying out of the war.  But Roosevelt knew that especially in a time of crisis he was to lead and not to follow the American public. "Roosevelt was inspired by an almost mystical belief in the glory and power of Presidential leadership...." Pictured here Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek of China (left),  Roosevelt (middle), and Winston Churchill (right) at the 1943 Cairo Conference.

People wanted Willkie to bargain with Hitler and they weren't happy with the lottery for the America's first peace time draft involving men twenty-one to thirty-five. Isolationist said those who voted for the draft would lose reelection. Roosevelt was relieved when Republican opponent Willkie endorsed some form of military service. 

Kennedy endorsed FDR saying the war involvement charges were false. Germany was very upset because they felt FDR could mold America's  ' " easily excitable character" ' and bring the United States into the war.

After the election, FDR enlisted Willkie's public support  to help England. His supporters feared hire taxes and loss of their businesses and they threatened Willkie who, ' " hurt and worried" ' agreed to help Roosevelt.

Kennedy felt he deserved an important post after the attack on Pearl Harbor had gotten America into war. But his old reputation of being anti-Semitic and his pro-appeasement  of Hitler kept the President at arms length. 

By 1944 Joe Kennedy was agonizing over the heroic death eldest son Joe who died while flying over the English Channel. Secretly supporting FDR's Republican opponent Thomas Dewey, Kennedy  still went to tell the President that Irish-Americans feared FDR was ' "Jewish Controlled." '

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With a new Jewish state was about to be born, Truman's met with Whitehouse council Clifford Clark and Secretary of State George Marshall. Clifford  argued that we should immediately recognize Israel to help protect her from five vastly larger Arab armies ready to pounce. He reasoned that Israel would be a reliable democratic state in the ' "unstable Middle East" '.  Also, America was trying to stop Russia from conquering the worlds plus America  had also always felt a ' " a great obligation" ' to stop persecution. Marshal argued that Israel didn't stand a chance and we could not come to her aid. "No longer lauding his ' "integrity," ' Marshall unbranded the President (in what Clifford found ' "a righteous Goddamned Baptist tone" '  for playing politics with the Middle East to attract Jewish voters." Marshal then said he wouldn't vote for Truman if he followed Clifford's advise and a shaken condemned Truman adjourned the meeting. This and other heated debates from both sides put  pressures on Truman. 

Britain would soon be leaving Palestine and a UN committee had proposed the area be partition into Jewish and Arab states with an economic union.  Assistant Secretary of State Loy Henderson felt American involvement would jeopardize oil supplies and the entire Arab world would become America's enemy. President Truman's Jewess business associations and good heart were to  face off with his Midwestern anti-Semitic background.

The Exodus, formerly President Warfield, arriving at 
Haifa (British Admiralty photo)

A dyspeptic Truman complained about Zionists in his diary.  " [Morgenthau had] no business calling me. The Jews have no sense of proportion, nor do they have any judgment on world affairs... The Jews, I find are very, very, selfish." They care not how many Estonians, Latvians, Finns., Poles, Yugoslavs or Greeks get murdered or mistreated... as long as the Jews get special treatment. Yet when  they have power--physical, financial, or political--neither Hitler nor Stalin has anything on them for cruelty or mistreatment to the underdog." 

Political pressure from both 
sides was immense.

After the partition into two states, Truman's arms embargo to the Middle East hurt Israel as Britain was arming the Arabs. But Jewish friends of Hoover got lax FBI enforcement of the embargo.

Leading up to the UN vote, Truman ordered the UN envoys from the U.S. not to use improper pressure and anger the Arabs. The first vote failed by one vote, Clark Clifford got Truman to let his aids lobby for partition and the final vote easily passed.  "Complaining of pressure from Washington, Arab delegates walked out."  Truman warned a pro-Zionist New York Congressman after the initiative passed that "the pressure boys almost beat themselves... I don't do business that way." 

By May of 1948 Clifford had reported to President Truman that the Jews in Palestine were showing ' " unexpected military strength." '

The President and Marshall had it out over immediate recognition. Truman won and Marshal sent someone to stop the United States U.N. delegation from reigning in mass. The Jewish State was declare, Truman recognize it, and Chaim Weizmann  became its first President of Israel.

Aide and friend Ted Sorensen conceded that as a Congressman, Senator and presidential candidate  Jack Kennedy had not given civil rights much thought. He steered away from integration during the long campaign by saying as a Senator, he had nothing to do with the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court integration ruling. Negroes like base ball star Jackie Robinson wanted nothing to do with him and winning the Solid South could prove difficult to Kennedy.

JFK won the 1960 close election by getting 90% of the Negro vote because he promised to help them have full equality. Fearing a strong backlash from Southerners and conservatives caused him to acted slowly. A May of 1963 Birmingham, Alabama riot resulted in smashed cars and burned buildings. It was America's most segregated. This got Whitehouse attention. Some Negroes  were getting interested in the more aggressive Black Panther movement and Alabama Governor George Wallace was about to try and stop two Negroes from integrating his state university.

By 1959 Kennedy was changing his mind. "Midterm Congressional victories had shifted the Democratic party's center of gravity toward Northern big cities. And with his recovery from a massive heart attack, Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson was planning to base his
own Presidential candidacy on the very white Southerners Kennedy had been wooing."  

Lt. Kennedy on his navy patrol boat PT-109

Bobby Kennedy told aids to do what it takes to get Negroes support. The Kennedy's got singer Harry Bellefonte to arrange a meeting with King The meeting went only well. Democrats stopped more of liberal a rebellion by countering a platform that promised the moon on Civil Rights by nominating the party's most famous white Southerner Senator Lyndon Johnson as Kennedy's running mate.

Harry Belafonte (center) at the 1963 Civil Rights March on Washington, D.C. with Sidney Poitier (left) and Charlton Heston.

The first break in the "Solid South": Missouri goes for Republican Theodore Roosevelt in the 1904 election.
(Cartoon by John T. McCutcheon.)

MUTUAL CONTEMPT Lyndon Johnson, Robert Kennedy, and the Feud That Defined a Decade. By Jeff Shesol. Illustrated. 591 pp. New York: W. W. Norton & Company. $32.50.

"In 1961, at a late-night supper in the White House living quarters, Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson accosted Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy in front of embarrassed friends and officials. ''Bobby, you do not like me,'' Johnson declared. ''Your brother likes me. Your sister-in-law likes me. Your daddy likes me. But you don't like me. Now, why? Why don't you like me?'' Kennedy did not respond to Johnson that evening, but his feelings were clear. As Jeff Shesol notes in ''Mutual Contempt,'' a penetrating and richly detailed account of the ''feud'' that shaped the 60's, Kennedy despised Johnson with a ferocity that startled many observers, while Johnson harbored fears of Kennedy that bordered on paranoia. '

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During the early days of the Freedom Riders, Attorney General Bobby Kennedy's deputy learn that the President thought the Freedom Riders were ' "a pain in the ass." ' 

The President had a mild response to the Freedom Rider problems and the New York Times remarked the response ' " did not sound like a profile in political courage." ' This bothered the President.

Click to enlarge most pictures.

Bobby's attempt to get protection assistance for the Freedom Riders from Alabama Governor Patterson had failed so fearing the murder of Martin Luther King, Jr. while on a speaking engagement on Sunday, May 21, Bobby provided fifty U.S. Marshals for protection.

When the public heard the news that the University of Mississippi had been integrated, they rioted and resistance reached the point of  armed insurrection. Kennedy called up the Army that he later felt was very slow to react. Soon the city of about 7,500 was guarded by 30,000 U.S. Army personal and Mississippi National Guardsmen.   

Eventually, the situation quieted down and a few week later President Kennedy, learning of the Soviet missile in Cuban, asked if they could hit Oxford, Mississippi. In the Summer of 1962, the Supreme Court order the integration of the University of Mississippi. Veteran James Meredith would be the first black student as the result of a 

legal battle he launched after realizing Kennedy, in spite of his inaugural address,  had hardly mentioned civil rights.

The Kennedy's were trying to avoid the national controversy similar to the one caused when President

James Meredith see integration of the U. of Mississippi

US Army trucks loaded with steel-helmeted US Marshals roll across the University of Mississippi campus on October 3, 1962.

For more pictures visit Source

31) IT'S GOING TO BE A CIVIL WAR.

"Before the Birmingham, only four percent of Americans had considered civil rights to be the country's number-one problem. After Bull Connor's dogs attacked protesters,  the figure skyrocketed to the fifty-two percent."

The president told the nation he was sending riot control troops to military bases near Birmingham but unlike Bobby he was not ready to make Civil Rights a crusade.

The President tried to convince Alabama Governor Wallace that King's nonviolent approach was better than that of Malcolm X and the Black Muslims but  Wallace responded that King and  Shuttlesworth were competing over ' " who could go to bed with the most nigger women-- and white and red women too!" '

The white house was trying to move the civil rights problem into the courts before someone got killed. They tried to get V.P. Johnson involved with a civil rights bill but he was upset about being ignored. The courts ordered the University of Alabama integrated, and Governor Wallace was made to look foolish in an attempt to stop the student entry into the University. The next day Kennedy made a televised speech to the nation framing the civil rights movement ' "in moral terms." ' Black American then realized the President had changed.

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Reverend "Fred" Shuttlesworth

Early activist Rosa Parks with King helped King's 1955 efforts to end Montgomery bus segregation. He was victorious as a United States District Court rules in Browder v. Gayle that racial segregation on all Montgomery public buses was illegal..^[67][68] King's role in the bus boycott transformed him into a national figure and the best-known spokesman of the civil rights movement.

Texas was a key political state for the coming 1964 election and tickets for a Kennedy Friday, November 22  speech in Austin were going so slowly that "Lyndon Johnson had to call in some chits so that JFK would not be embarrassed in his [Johnon's] home state."  JFK knew that Dallas was the stop before Austin. It was hostile terrain and to make light of this the soon the be President Johnson planned to male a joke as part of his introduction to  JFK in Austin. 

' " Mr. President, we're glad you made it out of Dallas alive." '

Asked about detente at his first press conference, Regan stated "Well, so far detent has been a one way street that the Soviet  Union has used to pursue its own aims," with the right ." He would negotiate but they sought a ' "one- world Communist state," ' with ' "the right to commit any crime, to lie, to cheat." ' " No presidency since at least Kennedy had talked so tough about the Kremlin in public."

President Reagan survived an early assassination attempt. He wouldn't go to Sunday church though he took the Bible literally, believed in the Messiah's second coming, and the imminence of Armageddon. From our summary Don't Know Much About History See From Evil Empire to The Axis of Evil

Nixon thought of himself as middleman for President elects Reagan's activities with the Soviets and Nixon pushed for a Secretary of State who would cut him in on foreign policy decisions.  Nixon was pleased with Alexander Haig who he describes as ' " the meanest, toughest, most ambitious son of a bitch I ever knew." '

Reagan dismissed  Soviet talks about negotiation and Russia knew he would go to the limit. Reagan use the hot line created by Kennedy and Premier Khrushchev to warn Russia of the dire consequences that could result  if they got  too aggressive during Polish martial law caused by Solidarity union activities. Their maverick leader  Lech Walesa had been arrested.

1980 strike at Gdansk Shipyard
 birthplace of Solidarity.

In a surprise to most people around him Reagan announced the idea of a $17 billion missile defense system to protect U.S. cities from Russian attack. Called Star Wars, critics called it a harebrained no work system.

America had picked up covert activities against the Soviets on every continent and planned a big military exercise in the Pacific Northwest. Pershing missiles soon to be deployed in Europe had made the Soviets vulnerable to a sneak attack from the U.S.  

The Soviets shot down a Korean airliner near Japan causing Regan to announce it was them against the world. Tensions were high on both sides.

The President depressed after an advanced showing of the TV movie The Day After which depicted Lawrence, Kansas the day after a nuclear war with the Soviets.

Reagan really felt good because of his reelection and because the Joint Chiefs of Staff assured him America had never better able to protect herself.

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President Reagan delivering the March 23, 1983 speech initiating SDI

The 1986 Soviets  Chernobyl nuclear power plant disaster was the only category 7 disaster until the 2011 Fukushima, Japan disaster.

President Reagan believed that the book of Revelations predicted that "...a star from heaven fell on the water" and "men died of the water..." ' and he told aids that the Bible had predicted the disaster. This aerial view of the damaged core and roof of the turbine hall at the photo center.  The adjacent reactor 3 (image lower left) shows minor fire damage.

Eventually Gorbachev agree to Reagan's proposed cut in nuclear arms and the site verified elimination of U.S. based European intermediate-range missiles. Star Wars would be the clincher. Reagan new the Soviets couldn't afford it so rather than let them off the hook and drop the program to get a treaty, he let the talks brake down. 

1985 Presidents Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev 

Reagan was asked during his 1986 Moscow  visit if he still thought of Russia as an evil empire. He said ' " No I was talking about another time, another era." '
Images for Berlin wall

1986 View of graffiti art from the West side of the wall's infamous "death strip"

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