On August 3d a letter came to me from Dark Harbor, Maine, where Colonel and Mrs. Roosevelt had gone to visit their daughter Mrs. Derby. “Darling Corinne:—Indeed it would be the greatest pleasure—I mean that exactly,—to have you bring little Douglas to Sagamore in the holidays. [He refers to my grandson, the son of Theodore Douglas Robinson.] All the people here are most considerate and the children a comfort. Little Edie is as pretty as a picture and a little darling; she has been very much of a chimney swallow this morning, clinging to whoever will take her up and cuddle her.” In the latter part of the letter he refers to my own great loss nine years before of my youngest son in his twentieth year, and says: “Your burden was even harder to bear than ours, for Stewart’s life was even shorter than Quentin’s and he had less chance to give shape to what there was in him, but, after all, when the young die at the crest of their life, in their golden morning, the degrees of difference are merely degrees in bitterness; and yet, there is nothing more cowardly than to be beaten down by sorrows which nothing we can do will change. Love to Douglas, Helen and Teddy, and to Fanny if she is with you.” The sentence of this brave letter in which my brother speaks of its being “cowardly to be beaten down by sorrows which nothing we do can change” is typical of the attitude which he had preserved through his whole life. Theodore Roosevelt was a great sharer and a great lover, but above all else he was essentially the courageous man who faced squarely whatever came, and by so facing conquered.
A few days later, again a dear letter came from Dark Harbor, and once more he dwells upon the baby girl who comforted him with her sweet, unconscious merriment. He says: “She is such a pretty little baby and with such cunning little ways. I fear I am not an unprejudiced witness. The little, curly-headed rascal is at this moment, crawling actively around my feet in her usual, absurd garb of blue overalls, drawn over her dainty dresses, because otherwise, she would ruin every garment she has on and skin her little bare knees. I heartily congratulate Teddy on going to camp. Give Corinne and Helen my dearest love and to all the others too.” The congratulations sent to my eldest son were indeed deserved, for the serious break to his leg having at last fully recovered, and a new camp near Louisville, Ky., having been started for men above the draft age, my son with real sacrifice resigned from his position in the Senate (having just been nominated for a second term), and started for Camp Taylor, where later he received his commission. My brother was very proud of the fact that, with hardly an exception, each son, nephew, or cousin of the Roosevelt and Robinson family was actively enrolled in the country’s service.
On August 18, having returned to Sagamore Hill, a little line comes to me of appreciation of a poem that I had written called “Italy.” “I am particularly glad you wrote it,” he says, and referring to my son-in-law, he continues: “Joe and Corinne lunched here yesterday; they were dear,—I admire them both so much.” He never failed, as I have said before, in giving me the joy of knowing when he admired those most dear to me. The following day, August 19, Mr. Colgate Hoyt, a generous neighbor, wrote to Colonel Roosevelt making the suggestion that a monument should be erected in honor of Quentin in some permanent place in the village of Oyster Bay, as Mr. Hoyt thought it would have an educational influence and value, as Quentin was the first resident of Oyster Bay (and the first officer) to make the supreme sacrifice in giving his life for his country. Mr. Hoyt wished to start this movement, but Colonel Roosevelt sent the following reply, a copy of which Mr. Hoyt gave me:
“My dear Mr. Hoyt:—That is a very nice letter of yours, but I do not think it would be advisable to try to put up a monument for Quentin. Of course, individually, our loss is irreparable but to the country he is simply one among many gallant boys who gave their lives for the great Cause. With very hearty thanks, Faithfully yours.”
The above letter and his statement that he and Quentin’s mother would prefer that their boy should lie where he fell were but what would have naturally been expected of Colonel and Mrs. Roosevelt.
In September, 1918, Theodore Roosevelt made an address on Lafayette Day, part of which ran as follows:
“Lafayette Day commemorates the service rendered to America in the Revolution by France. I wish to insist with all possible emphasis that in the present war, France, England, and Italy and the other Allies have rendered us similar services.... They have been fighting for us when they were fighting for themselves. [My brother was only repeating in 1918 what he had stanchly declared from the autumn of 1914.] Our army on the other side is now repaying in part our debt. It is now time and it is long behind time for America to bear her full share of the common burden.... It is sometimes announced that part of the Peace Agreement must be a League of Nations which will avert all war for the future and put a stop to the need of this nation preparing its own strength for its own defense. In deciding upon proposals of this nature, it behooves our people to remember that competitive rhetoric is a poor substitute for the habit of resolutely looking facts in the face. Patriotism stands in national matters as love of family does in private life. Nationalism corresponds to the love a man bears for his wife and children. Internationalism corresponds to the feeling he has for his neighbors generally. The sound nationalism is the only type of really helpful internationalism, precisely as in private relations, it is the man who is most devoted to his own wife and children who is apt in the long run to be the most satisfactory neighbor. The professional pacifist and the professional internationalist are equally undesirable citizens. The American pacifist has in the actual fact shown himself to be the ally of the German militarist. We Americans should abhor all wrong-doing to other nations. We ought always to act fairly and generously by other nations, but, we must remember that our first duty is to be loyal and patriotic citizens of our own nation. Any such League of Nations would have to depend for its success upon the adhesion of nine other nations which are actually or potentially the most powerful military nations; and these nine nations include Germany, Austria, Turkey, and Russia. The first three have recently and repeatedly violated and are now actively and continuously violating not only every treaty but every rule of civilized warfare and of international good faith. During the last year, Russia under the dominance of the Bolshevist has betrayed her Allies, has become the tool of the German autocracy and has shown such utter disregard of her national honor and plighted word and her international duties that she is now in external affairs the passive tool and ally of her brutal conqueror, Germany.
“What earthly use is it to pretend that the safety of the world would be secured by a League in which these four nations would be among the nine leading partners? Long years must pass before we can again trust in promises these four nations make. Therefore, unless our folly is such that it will not depart from us until we are brayed in a mortar, let us remember that any such treaty will be worthless unless our own prepared strength renders it unsafe to break it.... Let us support any reasonable plan whether in the form of a League of Nations or in any other shape which bids fair to lessen the probable number of future wars and to limit their scope, but let us laugh at all or any assertions that any such plan will guaranty Peace and Safety to the foolish, weak, or timid characters who have not the will and the power to prepare for their own defense. Support any such plan which is honest and reasonable, but support it as a condition to and never as a substitute for the policy of preparing our own strength for our own defense.
“I believe that this preparation should be, by the introduction in this country of the principle of universal training and universal service, as practised in Switzerland, and modified, of course, along the lines enacted in Australia, and in accordance with our needs. There will be no taint of Prussian militarism in such a system. It will merely mean to fit ourselves for self-defense and a great democracy in which order, law, and liberty are to prevail.”
I have quoted this speech because I am under the impression that it was his first actual declaration of any attitude toward a proposed League of Nations. In the early autumn of 1914 Theodore Roosevelt himself had written an article for the New York Times syndicate in which he suggested the possibility of a League of Nations, and the fact that he did make that suggestion was frequently used after his death—and, I think, in an unjustifiable manner—by the adherents of the Wilsonian League of Nations, with the desire to make the American public feel that my brother would have been in favor of Mr. Wilson’s league. In every pronouncement in connection with a tentative or possible league, my brother invariably laid stress upon an absolutely Americanized type of association. I asked him once about his article written in 1914, and he told me that while still hoping that some good might come from a league or association of nations, his serious study of world situations during the Great War had made him less optimistic as to the possibility of reaching effective results through such a possible league or association.