Theodore Roosevelt: The Monroe Doctrine Reigns

“Your letter seems to me to show the fundamental incapacity of even an educated and traveled Englishman to understand America or what America means… the bulk of the American people do believe in the Monroe Doctrine”

Roosevelt began his political career barnstorming for Benjamin Harrison, serving after his election on the Civil Service Commission, where he fought the spoilsmen.  In 1895, he became President of Board of the New York City Police Commissioners.  Here he set about reforming what was then considered one of the most corrupt police forces in America. It was also during this time that he learned first hand how the poor lived.   He met Jacob Riis, the journalist who wrote on the plight of the impoverished, and the two of them walked the beat together.  Riis later said of Roosevelt, “For two years we were brothers in (New York City’s crime-ridden) Mulberry Street. When he left I had seen its golden age… There is very little ease where Theodore Roosevelt leads, as we all of us found out. The lawbreaker found it out who predicted scornfully that he would “knuckle down to politics the way they all did,” and lived to respect him, though he swore at him, as the one of them all who was stronger than pull… that was what made the age golden, that for the first time a moral purpose came into the street. In the light of it everything was transformed.”

In 1823, then-President James Monroe set forth what today is a central principle of American foreign policy: the Monroe Doctrine. He said, “The American continents, by the free and independent condition which they have assumed and maintain, are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers…. We should consider any attempt on their part to extend their system to any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our peace and safety. With the existing colonies or dependencies of any European power we have not interfered and shall not interfere. But with the Governments who have declared their independence and maintained it, and whose independence we have, on great consideration and on just principles, acknowledged, we could not view any interposition for the purpose of oppressing them, or controlling in any other manner their destiny, by any European power in any other light than as the manifestation of an unfriendly disposition toward the United States.”

In 1895, the US first flexed the muscle of this policy in a way that would foreshadow the expansion of American power in the 20th century under future President Theodore Roosevelt.  In 1895, as Roosevelt was patrolling the streets, President Grover Cleveland faced a major foreign policy challenge.  The Venezuelan Boundary Dispute officially had begun in 1841, when the Venezuelan Government protested alleged British encroachment on Venezuelan territory. Great Britain owned British Guiana and a survey prepared by them in 1835 claimed an additional 30,000 square miles for Guiana from Venezuela, which sits immediately to its west. Venezuela disputed this, claiming land well into Guiana. This was further complicated by the discovery of gold even further into Venezuelan territory.  In 1876 Venezuela protested, broke diplomatic relations with Great Britain, and appealed to the United States for assistance, citing the Monroe Doctrine as justification for U.S. involvement. Only in 1895 did the US intervene.  In 1895, invoking the Monroe Doctrine, newly appointed U.S. Secretary of State Richard Olney demanded the British submit the boundary dispute to arbitration. Lord Salisbury (the British negotiator) responded that the Monroe Doctrine had no validity as international law. In December 1895, President Grover Cleveland asked Congress for authorization to appoint a boundary commission, proposing that the commission’s findings be enforced “by every means.” Congress passed the measure unanimously and talk of war with Great Britain began to circulate in the U.S. press.The commission was formally created on January 1, 1896.

Herbert de Haga Haig was a Royal Engineer and Quarter Master to Maj. Gen. Middleton during the Northwest Canadian Rebellion by Native Americans in 1885.  He was also a friend of Roosevelt and a fellow hunter.

Ever the hunter and outdoorsman, Roosevelt, missing hunting, says “I envy you your shooting. I have not had a days outing this year; and have not had a gun in my hands…”

Typed letter signed, on his New York City Police Department letterhead, January 6, 1895, to Haig. “My dear Haig – I was very glad to hear from you, and delighted to know that you have two children; I have five.  I have a terrific task here and I shall probably be put out of office before finishing it.  Still, I have accomplished a good deal and they can’t quite undo all the work I have done for some time. You are very kind to have remembered my sister and myself.  I envy you your shooting. I have not had a days outing this year; and have not had a gun in my hands, while my riding has been merely to occasionally potter around the roads on a pony.

“I am rather in a quandary how to answer what say of Cleveland the Venezuela message. To be frank with you, your letter seems to me to show the fundamental incapacity of even an educated and traveled Englishman to understand America or what America means; Although no admirer of Cleveland, I think he was essentially right in this Venezuela business, and I think the whole trouble came from Lord Salisbury’s failing to understand that the bulk of the American people do believe in the Monroe Doctrine.   However, I hardly think it worth while for us to discuss the matter; we disagree radically.

“I am much interested to know that you think of leaving the Army.  Among my friends here I think some of the most successful businessmen I know are graduates of West Point who served years in our Army, and then made up their minds that it did not open enough of a career for them. Faithfully yours, Theodore Roosevelt.”

We are not aware of any letter of Roosevelt commenting of the nature of the Monroe Doctrine having reached the market. Since this issue did not surface prior, and did so just days before the writing of this letter, this may in fact be the first such instance.

The Anglo-Venezuelan boundary dispute incident asserted for the first time a more outward-looking American foreign policy, particularly in the Western Hemisphere. Internationally the incident marked the United States’ emergence as a world power and gave notice that under the Monroe Doctrine it would exercise its claimed prerogatives in the Western Hemisphere.

Although the Monroe Doctrine of 1823 was essentially passive (it asked that Europeans not increase their influence or recolonize any part of the Western Hemisphere), by the 20th century a more confident United States under TR was willing to take on the role of regional policeman. In the early 1900s Roosevelt grew concerned that a crisis between Venezuela and its creditors could spark an invasion of that nation by European powers. The Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine of December 1904 stated that the United States would intervene as a last resort to ensure that other nations in the Western Hemisphere fulfilled their obligations to international creditors, and did not violate the rights of the United States or invite “foreign aggression to the detriment of the entire body of American nations.” As the corollary worked out in practice, the United States increasingly used military force to restore internal stability to nations in the region. Roosevelt declared that the United States might “exercise international police power in ‘flagrant cases of such wrongdoing or impotence.’” Over the long term the corollary had little to do with relations between the Western Hemisphere and Europe, but it did serve as justification for U.S. intervention in Cuba, Nicaragua, Haiti, and the Dominican Republic.