The evening leader., 1918-10-25
AN OPEN LETTER TO
THEODORE ROOSEVELT


in New York World, Oct. 10
Dear Sir:
In the face if this mornings mes
sage from the President of Germany,
feel impcIled to write this public let
ter to you. If withhold my name
from publication it is only because
long friendship with members of your
family makes me loath to wound them
by personal note and because l am
convinced that l speak for a very
large and almost unanimous consti-
tuency. The admiration for you
which l, along with hundreds of thou
sands Of fellow-Americans, have felt
in the past has been gradually under
mined by your failure to be loyal to
any one but yourself.
Both Pres dents who have followed
you in the occupation of the most
onerous and responsible position in
the world today have suffered from
your attacks, both friend and political
comrade; the other, political oppon-
ent charged with a task beyond the
power of any human being 20 perform
to the satisfaction Of a critical and
necessarily nuinformed country, has
never received from you even su-
spension Of comment, generous
thought or q helpful word. I have
read your public utterances faithfully
and l cannot recall one occasion on
which the winning Of the war has
been put before politics, or even evil
dence Of loyal support of your country
in its travail has been shown, or has
called forth that eloquence and force
of speech which you have not hest
tated to employ to attack, to weaken,
to try to destroy.
The poison you d;stil is often de-
monstrated, Based upon your ire
sponsible fulminations mistaken opin-
ions are formed, doubts are created,
faith shaken. In the household of
your friends and family, who look up
on you as an oracle in much the same
attitude Of mind which inspires the
encourage of the Kaiser, a fair esti-
mate Of the accomplishments of the
present Administration is impossible
to attain. Intemperate language, the
result Of conclusions drawn from in
sufficient data and misinformation, is
all one ever gets. They reflect you,
and you, apparently, are not capable
of a just judgement. Your vision is
clouded by partisan prejudice and ig-
noble jeolousy that the great war is
drawing to a close successfully for our
arms without and even in spite of
your efforts. You are reported in the
public press as having said IN late
speech at Oyster Bay that the "Presi-
dents diplomacy was worse than Sc
cret diplomacy, it was almost treach-
erous diplomacy" All who read those
words must have burned with rage
and shame. Your sons have gone to
the war. They went like countless
other brave young men. You "gave"
them only in the sense that you were
proud and glad to have them go.
Theirs was the gift, not yours. How
many other parents do you think have
done the same and said nothing?
But it is impossible for you to say
about anything. In this last
fact lies perhaps the one thing which
renders you harmless and powerless
to eXasperate. We have
been so long and so persistently mo
culated by small doses of your venom,
fevered and distressed by
it, that when we are exposed now to
The disease of Rooreveltism we do not
take it; we remain uninfected and
healthy. only we do protest that such
ltterances as the one | have cited are
olejudiced, ignorant, unpatriotic and
and we ask that for your
own sake, and preserve that remnant
If respect which as a former Presi- |
lent we should like to retain, you de-
iist from such offences.
| am, sir, yours with
PROFOUND INDIGNATION. /