IDEO: Political and Social Commentary

A Strong Voice From Our Past   It is proper to demand more from the man with exceptional advantages than from the man without them. A heavy moral obligation rests upon the man of means and upon the man of education to do their full duty by their country. On no class does this obligation rest more heavily than upon the men with a collegiate education, the men who are graduates of our universities. Their education gives them no right to feel the least superiority over any of their fellow citizens; but it certainly ought to make them feel that they should stand foremost in the honorable effort to serve the whole public by doing their duty as Americans in the body politic.   …the man of business and the man of science, the doctor of divinity and the doctor of law. The architect, the engineer, and the writer, all alike owe a positive duty to the community, the neglect of which they cannot excuse on any plea of their private affairs. They are bound to follow understandingly the course of public events; they are bound to try to estimate and form judgment upon public men; and they are bound to act intelligently and effectively in support of the principles which they deem to be right and for the best interests of the country.   …the educated man must realize that he is living in a democracy and under democratic conditions, and that he is entitled to no more respect and consideration than he can win by actual performance.   There is however, a need for proper critical work. Wrongs should be strenuously and fearlessly denounced; evil principles and evil men should be condemned. The politician who cheats or swindles, or the newspaperman who lies in any form, should be made to feel that he is an object of scorn for all honest men. We need fearless criticism, but we need that it should also be intelligent. At present, the man who is most apt to regard himself as an intelligent critic of our political affairs is often the man who knows nothing whatever about them. Criticism which is ignorant or prejudiced is a source of great harm to the nation; and where ignorant or prejudiced critics are themselves educated men, their attitude does real harm also the class to which they belong.   The tone of a portion of the press of the country toward public men, and especially toward political opponents, is degrading, all forms of coarse and noisy slander being apparently considered legitimate weapons to employ against men of the opposite party of faction. Unfortunately, not a few of the journals that pride themselves upon being independent in politics, and the organs of cultivated men, betray the same characteristics in a less coarse but quite as noxious form. All these journals do great harm by accustoming good citizens to see their public men, good and bad, assailed indiscriminately as scoundrels. The effect is twofold: the citizen learning, on the one hand, to disbelieve any statement he sees in any newspaper, so that the attacks on evil lose their edge; and on the other, gradually acquiring a deep-rooted belief that all public men are more or less bad. In consequence, his political instinct becomes hopelessly blurred, and he grows unable to tell the good representative from the bad. The worst offense that can be committed against the republic is the offense of the public man who betrays his trust; but second only to it comes the offense of the man who tries to persuade others that an honest and efficient public man is dishonest or unworthy.   Good can often be done by criticizing sharply and severely the wrong; but excessive indulgence in criticism is never anything but bad, and no amount of criticism can in any way take the place of active and zealous warfare for the right.   In conclusion, then, the man with a university education is in honor bound to take an active part in our political life, and to do his full duty as a citizen by helping his fellow citizens to the extent of his power in the exercise of the rights of self-government. He is bound to rank action far above criticism, and to understand that the man deserving of credit is the man who actually does the things, even though imperfectly, and not the man who confines himself to talking about how they ought to be done. He is bound to have a high ideal and to strive to realize it, and yet he must make up his mind that he will never be able to get the highest good, and that he must devote himself with all his energy to getting the best that he can. Finally, his work must be disinterested and honest, and it must be given without regard to his own success of failure, and without regard to the effect it has upon his own fortunes; and while he must show the virtues of uprightness and tolerance and gentleness, he must also show the sterner virtues of courage, resolution, and hardihood, and of desire to war with merciless effectiveness against the existence of wrong.   Excerpts from: "The College Graduate and Public Life," Theodore Roosevelt, first published in The Atlantic Monthly in August of 1894, and recently republished in The American Idea: The Best of the Atlantic Monthly, edited by Robert Vare. If these acknowledgements are not sufficient to satisfy any copyright issues that The Atlantic Monthly Group may have, I alone am responsible for this partial reproduction. Of course, it may be considered in the public domain at this point, and the entire essay can be viewed at:   www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1969/12/the-college-graduate-and-public-life/4483/   Many of our contemporary politicians and leaders are fond of comparing themselves to grand figures from our past, and I think it unfortunate that Theodore Roosevelt is rarely, if ever, mentioned. Here surely is a leader worthy of emulation, a man whose words ring as true today as they must have when first published over one hundred years ago. Indeed, apart from differences in style this essay might well have been written yesterday, which may or may not be an indication of how history repeats itself. I actually find it somewhat comforting—bad though things may seem to us today, it turns out that, in my opinion at least, not much has changed in the last hundred years, though every generation seems to feel that theirs are the worst of times.   Additionally, our politicians are certainly not the only part of the electorate who could benefit from revisiting the published works Mr. Roosevelt; those of us who spend a great deal of time carping and wringing our hands while, in the words of John Mayer, we are "waiting on the world to change," need also take heed. I know that in my case at least, fervently wishing for a leader with the determination, wisdom, dedication, and drive of Teddy Roosevelt to emerge from the pack is simply not enough; this essay can be seen as a call to action for us all.   Finally, we need not stop just with the writings of Mr. Roosevelt. An examination of his life and those of his family show that he was one of those rare individuals who not only "talked the talk," but also "walked the walk," and he apparently inspired his sons to follow his lead. His was truly a lifetime of service to his country, a man born into wealth who nevertheless felt duty bound to do that which he could for the good of the people. Rare indeed, at least in these modern times; to use an oft-quoted statement—they just don't make them like they used to!   —John Stegall