et us shape our conduct as a nation in accordance
with the highest rules of international morality. Let us treat others
justly and keep the engagements we have made, such as these in The Hague
conventions, to secure just treatment for others. But let us remember
that we shall be wholly unable to render service to others and
wholly unable to fulfill the prime law of national being, the law of
self-preservation, unless we are thoroughly prepared to hold our own.
Let us show that a free democracy can defend itself successfully against
any organized and aggressive military despotism."

The men in the camp heard him gladly and with enthusiasm. But the next
day the Secretary of War sent a telegram of censure to General Wood in
which he said:

"I have just seen the reports in the newspapers of the speech made
by ex-President Roosevelt at the Plattsburg camp. It is difficult to
conceive of anything which could have a more detrimental effect upon the
real value of this experiment than such an incident.... No opportunity
should have been furnished to any one to present to the men any matter
excepting that which was essential to the necessary training they were
to receive. Anything else could only have the effect of distracting
attention from the real nature of the experiment, diverting
consideration to issues which excite controversy, antagonism, and ill
feeling and thereby impairing if not destroying, what otherwise would
have been so effective."

On this telegram Roosevelt's comment was pungent: "If the Administration
had displayed one-tenth the spirit and energy in holding Germany and
Mexico to account for the murder of men, women, and children that it is
now displaying in the endeavor to prevent our people from being taught
the need of preparation to prevent the repetition of such murders in the
future, it would be rendering a service to the people of the country."

Theodore Roosevelt could have little effect upon the material
preparedness of the United States for the struggle which it was
ultimately to enter. But he could and did have a powerful effect upon
the spiritual preparedness of the American people for the efforts, the
trials, and the sacrifices of that struggle. No voice was raised more
persistently or more consistently than his. No personality was thrown
with more power and more effect into the task of arousing the people
of the United States to their duty to take part in the struggle against
Prussianism. No ma