1909-1913

Wife - Helen Herron (1861-1943)

Vice President James S. Sherman (1909-1913)

Personally, I have not the slightest race prejudice or feeling, and recognition of its existence only awakens in my heart a deeper sympathy for those who have to bear it or suffer from it, and I question the wisdom of a policy which is likely to increase it. Meantime, if nothing is done to prevent it, a better feeling between the negroes and the whites in the South will continue to grow, and more and more of the white people will come to realize that the future of the South is to be much benefited by the industrial and intellectual progress of the negro. The exercise of political franchises by those of this race who are intelligent and well to do will be acquiesced in, and the right to vote will be withheld only from the ignorant and irresponsible of both races.
--March 4, 1909

William Howard Taft (at 350 pounds) was as lethargic as Roosevelt was energetic. He did not really want to be president -- his dream was to be a Supreme Court Justice (he was eventually appointed by Warren Harding in 1921). Whenever he heard someone say "Mr. President", he would look around for Roosevelt.

By 1910:

Teddy, come blow your horn,
The sheep's in the meadow, the cow's in the corn,
The boy you left to tend the sheep
Is under the haystack fast asleep

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