Holding on to Pro-German Friends

In her, Theodore Roosevelt: a Strenuous Life, Kathleen Dalton raises one more reason hitherto unmentioned to explain the passion with which Roosevelt denounced all pro-Germans during World War I. According to Dalton, it “had a great deal to do with his desire to distance himself from his former closeness to German-American intellectuals and from his earlier praise for the German welfare state.”²⁸⁷

Yet during the early months of the war Roosevelt most definitely did not distance himself from his German or his German-American friends. Quite the opposite, even to his anti-German British and American friends he still assured his admiration of and his sense of solidarity with Germans.

Roosevelt wrote to Arthur Lee in August 1914:

“As for the Germans, I have a very real and sincere liking and respect for them individually. In all essentials they are like ourselves – indeed so far as Americans are concerned they are largely ourselves, for we have immense German strain in our blood, and I for instance number among my ancestors Germans as well as Englishmen, although they are outnumbered by my Dutch and Scotch ancestors. I can honestly say that I have not one particle of feeling except of respect and kindly regard for the German people as such.”²⁸⁸

During the first year of the war, Roosevelt was engaged in an active correspondence with a number of Germans and German-Americans, including, Hugo Münsterberg, George Viereck, Albert Apponyi (Hungarian), Edmund Robert Otto von Mach, Bernhard Dernburg, and Friedrich von Stumm; all of them pro-German. Roosevelt’s willingness to stay with his German-American friends even after July 1914 was understandable knowing his opinion of them: “On the whole, I think that of all the elements that have come here [the United States] during the past century the Germans have on the average represented the highest type.”²⁸⁹

Roosevelt also openly met with pro-Germans during World War I. In his letter of December 2, 1914, he wrote von Stumm: “Dernburg took dinner with me the other evening and Kuno Meyer takes lunch with me next Sunday.” To give grounds for these meetings TR mentioned that he was

287 Dalton, p. 443–444.

288 TR to Lee, Aug 21, 1914;Letters, vol. 7, p. 810.

289 TR to von Mach, Nov 7, 1914;Letters, vol. 7, p. 834.

doing his best “to keep in touch with the German side of the case.”²⁹⁰ Certainly this does not sound like Roosevelt was distancing himself from the pro-Germans. In addition, he defended Münsterberg, when a prospective benefactor had allegedly threatened to cut out of his will a bequest of $10,000,000 to Harvard unless the pro-German Professor Münsterberg was fired. Münsterberg offered his resignation, but Harvard, supported by Roosevelt, requested him to withdraw it.

Eventually, Münsterberg did just so. At least in late 1914 Roosevelt’s dedication to free speech and his loyalty to his friends were, then, stronger than his fear of getting associated with a German-American.²⁹¹

Not only did Roosevelt try to stay in touch with his pro-German friends, but he also seemed to sincerely regret that he had to alienate them with his opinions. In his letter to von Stumm he wrote that “I wish I could see you both [von Stumm and his wife], although I do not suppose you would care to see me at present.”²⁹² This of course illustrates how World War I signified a great personal loss to Roosevelt. His pro-German friends were deserting him, not the other way around. He, for example, made his case for Belgium in his letter to his Hungarian friend, Albert Apponyi, in March 1915 and ended up by saying: “You will not be satisfied with this letter; but, believe me, I am as staunchly as ever your friend and admirer and the friend and admirer of your people.”²⁹³ Hence, it would seem that at least in the beginning of the war it was Roosevelt who tried with every means possible to hold on to these friendships.

Roosevelt also tried to soothe his pro-German friends in many ways. He did everything he could to convince them that he opposed Germany only because of its behavior towards Belgium – he was in no way influenced, he assured, by prejudice. TR stressed that he had reached his decision to oppose Germany by following a principle – judge each country by its conduct – which would in turn make him a stout champion of Germany’s cause, if Germany were wronged by France, England, or Russia.²⁹⁴ To make his German friends feel better, TR reminded that every country had been wrong at some point in their history. He enumerated breaches of international morality committed in the past by England and France. He even made a rare confession of guilt by digging up some dirt from

290 TR to von Stumm, Dec 2, 1914;Letters, vol. 7, p. 855. Kuno Meyer, a German professor of Celtic at the University of Liverpool.

291 TR to Münsterberg, Nov 2, 1914;Letters, vol. 7, p. 826–827. See Morison’s footnote on the same pages.

292 TR to von Stumm, Dec 2, 1914;Letters, vol. 7, p. 855.

293 TR to Apponyi, Mar 5, 1915;Letters, vol. 7, p. 907.

294 Roosevelt, “The International Posse Comitatus,”NYT, Nov 8, 1914, p. SM1; TR to von Mach, Nov 7, 1914;Letters, vol. 7, p. 834; TR to von Stumm, Dec 2, 1914;Letters, vol. 7, p. 855–856.

the past of his own country, admitting that “the United States behaved in this way toward Spain in connection with Florida a century ago.” Roosevelt reminded, however, that the Hague conferences were supposed to mark a step forward: the whole idea of them had been to prevent such wrongs from occurring again.²⁹⁵

Roosevelt further tried to communicate to his German friends that he honored their convictions.

These were deeply patriotic men, he realized, and even if he was of the opinion that it was a citizen’s duty to try to make his country behave right, it was also his duty to defend it even when it was wrong. “If I were a German,” he confessed, “I should now be fighting for Germany....”²⁹⁶

All of this illustrates how strongly Roosevelt felt about Belgium. His convictions forced him to follow a course of action which he knew would destroy many friendships that were dear to him. He had regrets over this, but he did not hesitate. Accordingly, Roosevelt wrote to Rudyard Kipling: “I have a very genuine respect and admiration for the Germans, and I alienate them with great reluctance, and only because I feel that it is my imperative duty to follow the course I am following, with no more regard to their feelings than to its effect upon me personally.”²⁹⁷ Roosevelt frequently admitted as much in public, too. He wrote in America and the World War: “It has been a matter of very real regret to me to have speak in the way I have felt obliged to speak as to German wrong-doing in Belgium, because so many of my friends, not only Germans, but Americans of German birth and even Americans of German descent, have felt aggrieved at my position.”²⁹⁸

295 Roosevelt,America and the World War, p. 20–21.

296 TR to von Stumm, Dec 2, 1914;Letters, vol. 7, p. 856.

297 TR to Kipling, Nov 4, 1914;Letters, vol. 7, p. 830.

298 Roosevelt,America and the World War, p. 232.