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clarice

(5,504 posts)
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 04:33 PM Jun 2016

I found this 1907 quote from T. Roosevelt concerning immigration......

Theodore Roosevelt's ideas on Immigrants and being an AMERICAN in 1907.

"In the first place, we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin. But this is predicated upon the person's becoming in every facet an American, and nothing but an American ... There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn't an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag ... We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language ... and we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people."

Theodore Roosevelt 1907

Responders please take note.. I am neither condemning nor condoning TR's statements.
I just thought that it was an interesting take for 1907.

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I found this 1907 quote from T. Roosevelt concerning immigration...... (Original Post) clarice Jun 2016 OP
The World is my country, all mankind are my brethren, and to do good is my religion. Thomas Paine Tierra_y_Libertad Jun 2016 #1
One of my favorites. Thanks.nt clarice Jun 2016 #3
+1 nt Xipe Totec Jun 2016 #7
T. Paine knew how his way around words, but did anyone check with Mrs. Paine on this? merrily Jun 2016 #52
He was excellent, believe me. He had all the best words. The best words. Sad. Bucky Jun 2016 #53
It's not all or nothing. I can praise Paine for his greatness and note that, if doing good merrily Jun 2016 #55
Hell, I don't meet his qualifications, and I was born here n/t arcane1 Jun 2016 #2
lol...good one. nt clarice Jun 2016 #4
Unfortunately, at the time, the term 'American' was defined solely by the white Christian power Aristus Jun 2016 #5
Yes...but unless I am wrong....TR...didn't seem.... clarice Jun 2016 #6
No. You're right. Aristus Jun 2016 #10
Here is another Teddy R quote for you to read bravenak Jun 2016 #13
I guess I stand corrected. nt clarice Jun 2016 #23
Priase and Back handed all in one? 4Q2u2 Jun 2016 #59
That's what I was thinking. T Roosevelt might have been OK with European immigrants, but I bet Hoyt Jun 2016 #9
You and I had the same thought at the same time. Aristus Jun 2016 #11
You were first, although I was responding and looked up something about TR and saw the Hoyt Jun 2016 #15
Neither condemning nor condoning? Xipe Totec Jun 2016 #8
Apparently...you are un-used to the thrust and parry of intelligent debate. nt clarice Jun 2016 #25
Complete acculturation historically happens within three generations LanternWaste Jun 2016 #12
Here is another one bravenak Jun 2016 #14
TR was a racist philosslayer Jun 2016 #16
Mount Rushmore is an abomination bravenak Jun 2016 #17
who would you include instead? nt clarice Jun 2016 #24
No one. okasha Jun 2016 #29
The entire sculpture???? How so? nt clarice Jun 2016 #31
The Paha Sapa ( Black Hills) okasha Jun 2016 #34
Didn't know that. thanks nt clarice Jun 2016 #45
I agree bravenak Jun 2016 #37
The beauty of the mountains far surpass any human alterations bravenak Jun 2016 #38
Good input. Thanks B.nt clarice Jun 2016 #50
Cultural and artistic. okasha Jun 2016 #35
And what particular President would you replace him with? clarice Jun 2016 #28
four great Americans Bucky Jun 2016 #54
Excellent !!! nt clarice Jun 2016 #56
U.S.A. history is damned ugly and unexceptional. hunter Jun 2016 #41
An enduring but very flawed sentiment loyalsister Jun 2016 #18
I don't think that's what the quote says at all clarice Jun 2016 #26
And who has made that demand? loyalsister Jun 2016 #36
Ok.....let me throw this out... BTW...how are you L Sister?....... clarice Jun 2016 #51
I'm talking about the hatred of any language other than English loyalsister Jun 2016 #57
I wouldn't and my 840high Jun 2016 #42
Thank you. nt clarice Jun 2016 #49
I take exception to the idea that "immigrants" send money "home". lumberjack_jeff Jun 2016 #19
here are some more gems i found RE: former presidents frankieallen Jun 2016 #20
Yes... ignorant statements know no party line. Thank you. nt clarice Jun 2016 #30
Yet Harry Truman integrated the armed forces, and Lyndon Johnson signed the civil rights acts... roamer65 Jun 2016 #43
One language, one loyalty, one allegiance, one culture... bhikkhu Jun 2016 #21
Although..... demanding that a Country bend to your particular cultural... clarice Jun 2016 #27
Ummm. No. matt819 Jun 2016 #22
Interesting.. peace13 Jun 2016 #32
I would say that we need several million more of her. nt clarice Jun 2016 #33
He was a white supremacist. Odd that you're quoting him to justify yourself. LeftyMom Jun 2016 #39
Please re-read disclaimer in OP.nt clarice Jun 2016 #46
Y'all are forgetting the Phillipine-American War Nevernose Jun 2016 #40
Point taken...thanks nt clarice Jun 2016 #47
Hmmmm, all my right wing friends are posting this on facebook! Hmmmmm.....interesting. nt Logical Jun 2016 #44
Please stick to the subject of the OP. I don't care what your right wing friends are posting.nt clarice Jun 2016 #48
Read number 53 on the US citizenship test. Boudica the Lyoness Jun 2016 #58

merrily

(45,251 posts)
52. T. Paine knew how his way around words, but did anyone check with Mrs. Paine on this?
Tue Jun 28, 2016, 10:32 AM
Jun 2016

IIRC, wily Ben Franklin found the silver-tongued (and silver-penned) T. Paine in England and thought he could help the revolutionary cause. Franklin was correct. Paine did know how to stir Americans. But, he seems to have been a bit shady in other respects.

Bucky

(53,805 posts)
53. He was excellent, believe me. He had all the best words. The best words. Sad.
Tue Jun 28, 2016, 10:47 AM
Jun 2016

Paine was an alcoholic and a failed businessman and a crappy engineer and a screw up as a politician (he got jailed in France before the Terror after having been elected to the French assembly) and had a tendency to be ingrateful to those who helped him out of his numerous scrapes.

But that said, he was a troubled genius and his wisdom and clarity of political vision speaks for itself. If we can't get past the fact that George Washington was a slaveholder and Abe Lincoln was a corporate railroad lawyer and Thomas Jefferson had a predilection for married women and underage slaves and Martin Luther King was a serial philanderer and John Kennedy was a drug fiend and Elizabeth Cady Stanton was an outright racist.... then we lose all the gifts of the people who, despite their flaws, gave us the imperfect gift of a liberal democracy and a legacy of ideals that we should all live up to.

As my Grandma told me, and I agree, with people you got to take the good and keep the bad in perspective--there's only been one perfect man in history. Of course she was talking about Jesus while I was thinking it was George Clooney. But that's a different topic.

merrily

(45,251 posts)
55. It's not all or nothing. I can praise Paine for his greatness and note that, if doing good
Tue Jun 28, 2016, 10:53 AM
Jun 2016

was really his religion, he lapsed a lot.

Aristus

(66,096 posts)
5. Unfortunately, at the time, the term 'American' was defined solely by the white Christian power
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 04:39 PM
Jun 2016

structure.

And if conservative white Americans don't like the plethora of hyphenated-Americans (a term that TR himself used), then they can play their part in ensuring that every American who isn't a white Christian receives equal treatment in the eyes of the nation, the culture, and the law.

I expect that many who define their national standing with a hyphenated phrase are doing so because they are being treated as 'less-than' by the prevailing social majority, and wish to express their pride in who they are.

 

clarice

(5,504 posts)
6. Yes...but unless I am wrong....TR...didn't seem....
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 04:43 PM
Jun 2016

to have a virulent racists or xenophobic agenda attached to most of his policies.

Aristus

(66,096 posts)
10. No. You're right.
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 04:48 PM
Jun 2016

He was definitely pretty progressive for the times on the issue of race.

As I recall, he only had one real moment of weakness. He invited Booker T. Washington to dinner at the White House, and the nation's bigots went berserk, demanding that he never do that again. Rather than flip them the bird and carry right on inviting whoever the hell he wanted to, which would have been perfectly in character for him, he backed down instead. Neither Washington, nor any other prominent African-American of the time was invited back to be a guest at TR's White House.

 

bravenak

(34,648 posts)
13. Here is another Teddy R quote for you to read
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 04:53 PM
Jun 2016
A perfectly stupid race can never rise to a very high plane; the negro, for instance, has been kept down as much by lack of intellectual development as by anything else; but the prime factor in the preservation of a race is its power to attain a high degree of social efficiency. Love of order, ability to fight well and breed well, capacity to subordinate the interests of the individual to the interests of the community, these and similar rather humdrum qualities go to make up the sum of social efficiency. The race that has them is sure to overturn the race whose members have brilliant intellects, but who are cold and selfish and timid, who do not breed well or fight well, and who are not capable of disinterested love of the community. In other words, character is far more important than intellect to the race as to the individual. We need intellect, and there is no reason why we should not have it together with character; but if we must choose between the two we choose character without a moment's hesitation.
 

4Q2u2

(1,406 posts)
59. Priase and Back handed all in one?
Tue Jun 28, 2016, 11:38 AM
Jun 2016

I am curious to your view of this quote?
I am personally still trying to wring out the full meaning.

TY

 

Hoyt

(54,770 posts)
9. That's what I was thinking. T Roosevelt might have been OK with European immigrants, but I bet
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 04:47 PM
Jun 2016

he was not referring to Americans from south of the border. And, he darn sure wasn't a friend of "African-Americans." About all they can say for him is that he invited Booker T. Washington to the White House for dinner, the first time an American Prez invited a Black man to the White House for dinner. That is sad.

 

Hoyt

(54,770 posts)
15. You were first, although I was responding and looked up something about TR and saw the
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 05:02 PM
Jun 2016

Last edited Mon Jun 27, 2016, 09:46 PM - Edit history (1)

Booker T. Washington reference as if he was a civil rights activist.

A quick aside, I actually got it into about 15 years ago with an honest to god grand wizzard -- or whatever they are called -- of the Oklahoma KKK who had the gall to claim he was a "civil rights activist."

Xipe Totec

(43,872 posts)
8. Neither condemning nor condoning?
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 04:46 PM
Jun 2016

The very fact you posted these words means they resonate with you.

Don't throw the stone and hide your hand.

 

LanternWaste

(37,748 posts)
12. Complete acculturation historically happens within three generations
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 04:52 PM
Jun 2016

Complete acculturation historically happens within three generations, so I often wonder why the consistent focus on "every facet an American"

 

bravenak

(34,648 posts)
14. Here is another one
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 05:00 PM
Jun 2016
DON’T GO SO FAR AS TO THINK THAT THE ONLY GOOD INDIANS ARE DEAD INDIANS, BUT I BELIEVE NINE OUT OF TEN ARE, AND I SHOULDN’T LIKE TO INQUIRE TOO CLOSELY INTO THE CASE OF THE TENTH.”

Teddy R

okasha

(11,573 posts)
34. The Paha Sapa ( Black Hills)
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 07:54 PM
Jun 2016

are sacred land to the Lakota Nation.

Here's a rough equivalent: imagine someone painting a black and white cow and scrawling "Eat more chicken" over the Sistine Chapel ceiling.

 

bravenak

(34,648 posts)
38. The beauty of the mountains far surpass any human alterations
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 08:17 PM
Jun 2016

It was a prideful venture. I'd not have done it. I prefer doing mosaics. A nice mosaic mural somewhere would suffice and last a long time if done with care. Centuries. More even.

hunter

(38,264 posts)
41. U.S.A. history is damned ugly and unexceptional.
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 09:08 PM
Jun 2016

That's not what we are taught grades K-12.

My Wild West family believed they had a friendly relationships with local Indians, but they sure as hell knew the members of their own white community who were out killing and raping and swindling Indians.

My grandfather didn't attend my marriage to, in his words, "a Mexican girl." In his world it was okay to date Mexicans but you didn't marry them. To his credit, he got past that.

loyalsister

(13,390 posts)
18. An enduring but very flawed sentiment
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 05:17 PM
Jun 2016

AMERICAN is used incredibly arrogantly and is so deeply embedded that I didn't realize until someone pointed it out to me recently.

Canadians, Mexicans, Aregentinians, Chilleans, among others are from an American continant. Yet, the longstanding myth that the only true "Americans" are citizens of the USA continues to prevail.

Forcing cultural assimilation is intended to apease people who are offended by hearing or seeing in Spanish. The more languages, the better IMO.

 

clarice

(5,504 posts)
26. I don't think that's what the quote says at all
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 07:37 PM
Jun 2016

If you decided to emmigrate to a Country who's culture you where unfamiliar with... would you demand that that culture bend to your native cultural values and language? I wouldn't.

loyalsister

(13,390 posts)
36. And who has made that demand?
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 08:03 PM
Jun 2016

No one that I know of. In fact, USAers of Mexican heritage were discouraged from speaking their native language. Many people feel a great loss over that. They should have been comfortable using the language of their parents and the fact that they didn't is hate inspired.

 

clarice

(5,504 posts)
51. Ok.....let me throw this out... BTW...how are you L Sister?.......
Tue Jun 28, 2016, 10:32 AM
Jun 2016

Let's assume that the "International Language of Business is English"
Is encouraging immigrants to speak in their native language actually EXCLUDING them
from many business opportunities? And if so, what is the actual agenda of the people
pushing natavism? Is it to hamper certain groups of people from the business mainstream? And if THAT is true,
I find it deplorable.

loyalsister

(13,390 posts)
57. I'm talking about the hatred of any language other than English
Tue Jun 28, 2016, 11:29 AM
Jun 2016

So much that people complain about pushing 1 for english during an automated call. The all too common call for people to not just learn English, but to give their own language up. I hear that from people quite often, so I have a pretty staunch belief that people should be able to use their native language without me arrogantly considering it to be an imposition. Your business example is interesting considering that we, as a nation, we are still too nativist and foolish to use the metric system.

 

frankieallen

(583 posts)
20. here are some more gems i found RE: former presidents
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 05:31 PM
Jun 2016

“Negroes are excited by a freedom they don’t understand and are not equipped to handle the demands and privileges of citizenship.” -Woodrow Wilson

“I went n****r chasing on Monday. Right through Central Africa: Vine St. There was no trace of that Nelson n****r.” -Harry Truman

“I’ll have those n****rs voting Democratic for the next 200 years.” -Lyndon Johnson

“African Americans watch the same news at night that ordinary Americans do.” -Bill Clinton

roamer65

(36,739 posts)
43. Yet Harry Truman integrated the armed forces, and Lyndon Johnson signed the civil rights acts...
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 10:20 PM
Jun 2016

because they knew it was time to rise above their personal prejudices.

Rethugs are incapable of such behavior.

bhikkhu

(10,708 posts)
21. One language, one loyalty, one allegiance, one culture...
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 05:32 PM
Jun 2016

few individuals are that submissive and simple, even among the winger crowd. A nation like would be a caricature of a horribly self-limited bit of humanity.

 

clarice

(5,504 posts)
27. Although..... demanding that a Country bend to your particular cultural...
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 07:39 PM
Jun 2016

proclivities is divisive at best.

matt819

(10,749 posts)
22. Ummm. No.
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 06:22 PM
Jun 2016

My grandparents immigrated to the US around 1910. Lower East Side. NY. They learned almost no English and spoke almost only Yiddish until they died some 70 years later.

In this way they represented the essence of what it meant to be an American. If didn't matter what language you spoke or how much you did or did not assimilate. America was a safe haven against the threats they faced in eastern Europe before WWI.

My parents and sibling followed the usual pattern of first and second generation Americans since the beginning of the US. And I think we are a better country as a result, regardless of whether we are fluent in English or assimilate as TR wrote.

Indeed, one can argue that while long term Americans may very well speak English, in some communities assimilation is the last thing on their minds. Witness the anger among many white southerners who are still fighting a war they lost more than 150 years ago.

 

peace13

(11,076 posts)
32. Interesting..
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 07:48 PM
Jun 2016

My little friend Pearl, age 85 who immigrated here as a child said, 'The problem is that people come and they don't melt.' This was ten years ago. She worked hard to be an American and was not happy about what she was seeing.

LeftyMom

(49,212 posts)
39. He was a white supremacist. Odd that you're quoting him to justify yourself.
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 08:22 PM
Jun 2016

Can you finish telling us what your issue with the SPLC is now? I'd *really* like to know.

Nevernose

(13,081 posts)
40. Y'all are forgetting the Phillipine-American War
Mon Jun 27, 2016, 09:02 PM
Jun 2016

We destroyed a nation and brutalized thousands of Filipinos from 1899-1915 (or thereabouts). Teddy was CiC and president, and bears a great deal of the responsibility.

Mark Twain and many other progressives hated TR's guts: http://www.twainquotes.com/Roosevelt.html

(Still a big fan of the national park system)

 

clarice

(5,504 posts)
48. Please stick to the subject of the OP. I don't care what your right wing friends are posting.nt
Tue Jun 28, 2016, 10:20 AM
Jun 2016
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