teddy roosevelt and standard oil -- 3/24/25

• 0 COMMENTS

Today's selection-- from The Power and the Money by Tevi Troy. William McKinley’s assassination and Teddy Roosevelt’s ascension to the presidency was bad news for corporate giant Standard Oil:

“Theodore ‘Teddy’ Roosevelt had a meteoric rise to the White House. Born to a wealthy New York family in 1858, he wrote his first book—a naval history of the War of 1812—before finishing his studies at Harvard. He joined the New York State Assembly in 1882, but came to prominence as police commissioner of New York in 1895. Six years later, he would be president.

“In those six years Roosevelt held a succession of jobs of increasing importance and responsibility. Roosevelt left the commissioner's post to become assistant secretary of the Navy, where he was intimately involved in preparations for the Spanish-American War of 1898. He then left his post to gain great fame as the head of the Rough Riders, celebrated for their charge up San Juan Hill in Cuba. With his newfound popularity, Roosevelt ran for and won the governorship of New York.

“In 1900, William McKinley put the popular and reform-minded Roosevelt on the presidential ticket, replacing first-term vice president, Garret Hobart, who had died in 1899. This came at the urging and maneuvering of Standard Oil's Henry Rogers, with the help of Pennsylvania senator Matthew Quay and New York political boss Thomas Platt—and against the wishes of Republican kingmaker Mark Hanna. Rogers later said, ‘We forced Roosevelt's nomination as Vice-President. He was very troublesome as Governor of New York and we wanted him out of the way ... ‘ It was a miscalculation. Roosevelt, who often employed the rhetoric of a progressive reformer, knew that Standard Oil and other industrialists had maneuvered to get him out of the state house and into the seemingly ineffectual position of vice president. He hated Rockefeller and Standard Oil, and he did not much like J.P. Morgan, either.

Artist's conception of the shooting of McKinley

“It did not take long before it became clear that Standard Oil and Roosevelt's other enemies had miscalculated in getting the Rough Rider on the presidential ticket. Roosevelt served only nine months as vice president before becoming president on September 14, 1901, when McKinley was assassinated by Polish-American anarchist Leon Czolgosz. For the 42-year-old Roosevelt, it was a stunning ascension: six jobs in six years, culminating in the presidency.

“As a New York politician with a reformist sensibility, Roosevelt was certainly aware of Rockefeller and Standard Oil. Rockefeller even donated $1,000 to Roosevelt's failed mayoral campaign of 1886, viewing Roosevelt as less dangerous than the radical economic journalist—and best-selling author—Henry George. Standard Oil executives such as Henry Flagler also backed Roosevelt's 1898 run for governor, although they were disappointed when Governor Roosevelt turned on them, backing both a corporate franchise tax and regulation of factories. A disappointed Flagler said of Roosevelt's pivot, ‘I have no command of the English language that enables me to express my feelings regarding Mr. Roosevelt.’

“The initial response within Standard Oil to McKinley's assassination and Roosevelt's ascension was panic. Standard Oil executives worried about what a President Roosevelt might do, and there was also concern that Czosglosz's action may have foreshadowed a wider radical response. Rockefeller doubled the bodyguards around his estate and stayed indoors in case he might have been targeted by assassins as well.

“Initially, it was an overreaction. Roosevelt was not as radical at the time, and Czosglosz was not part of a larger anarchist conspiracy. But Roosevelt definitely made things harder for Standard Oil than McKinley or his predecessors had. Roosevelt used his ‘bully pulpit’ to attack industrial ‘evils,’ and pushed the creation of a Bureau of Corporations to look into monopolistic corporate practices. As part of that effort, Roosevelt was willing to use Rockefeller as a punching bag, and even to be misleading in the process. While the Bureau of Corporations bill was being considered in Congress, Roosevelt railed against improper lobbying against the bill, citing telegrams sent to six senators opposing Roosevelt's legislation. Roosevelt claimed, inaccurately, that Rockefeller had sent them. The telegrams had indeed been sent, but by John Jr., who was still at the company, and not the retired—and reviled—senior Rockefeller. No matter. Roosevelt called the telegrams ‘the most brazen attempt in the history of lobbying,’ and his attack made front-page news. The publicity aided Roosevelt's effort in favor of the bill, which passed in February of 1903. Roosevelt credited the telegram ploy with helping him get the bill passed, and the CEO-as-villain motif had demonstrated its potency.

“Even with the bill passed, and despite the occasional presidential potshots, Rockefeller and Standard Oil remained relatively unscathed in Roosevelt's first term. The oil companies were not the Bureau's first targets, and Standard Oil still felt that it could work with Roosevelt, even supporting him for a second term. But other winds were blowing during Roosevelt's first term that would soon intensify the confrontation, with severe implications for Standard Oil, and for Rockefeller.”

author:	Tevi Troy
title:	The Power and the Money: The Epic Clashes Between Commanders in Chief and Titans of Industry
publisher:	Regnery History
pages:	14-16